


cover your crystal eyes

by cabinfever



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Galaxy Garrison, Galra Keith (Voltron), Irresponsible Use of Paint, M/M, Painter Keith (Voltron), Panic Attacks, Polite Gay Disaster Shiro, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-07
Updated: 2018-11-13
Packaged: 2019-07-08 04:56:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 46,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15923330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cabinfever/pseuds/cabinfever
Summary: It's only logical, after all, that the hero and lone survivor of the Kerberos mission should get his portrait painted for the Garrison walls. Shiro doesn't agree, but if high command insists, then he's in no position to refuse. He expects a few hours of boredom and stilted, polite conversation with whichever artist the Garrison has contracted to do their official paintings.He doesn't expect Keith.“What’re you drawing?” Shiro asks quietly, glancing away from the clear sky to study how Keith looks bathed in moonlight, bowed over his chest as if in prayer.Keith’s silent for a moment, tracing a straight line from a circular scar to the tip of one of the great long ones along Shiro’s ribs. “Just connecting the dots,” he replies. “Constellations.”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> title taken from "crystals" by of monsters and men. the full lyric that inspired this was:
> 
>  
> 
> _cover your crystal eyes_  
>  and let your colors bleed and blend with mine  
> 

There’s a gap in the wall of pictures.

Shiro stares at the portraits of every important Galaxy Garrison officer in history, and he says, “This just seems like a bit much.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Commander Iverson-”

“No need with the titles, Shirogane, you know that.”

Shiro stops and course corrects, adjusting his approach accordingly. “Iverson. Sir.”

Iverson sighs but allows it anyway.

“I just don’t think that I need an official portrait just because I’m being promoted.”

“Nonsense. Everyone of your rank gets one; it’s a rite of passage. And if anyone deserves to have their face on the wall of the Galaxy Garrison, it’s you.” Iverson gestures to the wall of paintings. “All of these people earned their place. Even me. If you’re on this wall, everyone will see you and know you’re a real soldier. A true pilot.”

“Yeah, a pilot who disappeared for a year on a three-man mission and came back alone without an arm or pigmentation in part of his hair, and with a billion new scars.” He frowns. “One of which is prominently on his face.”

Iverson furrows his brow. “Well, we can’t win them all. You look good, Shirogane.”

And maybe Iverson’s right. Shiro looks at one of the mirrored chrome columns in this central chamber, inspecting his reflection. Same old Shiro, really. His hair might be partially shock-white instead of black now, but the style’s the same. So is his face, if you don’t count the scars. He still looks young, like whatever happened to him didn’t change him too much. 

So maybe it wasn’t that bad.

Not bad for a guy who went missing in deep space and returned without an arm or memories, if he says so himself.

But he’s not here to compliment himself. Instead-

“Sam and Matt should be here,” he says softly, staring at the empty spot on the wall where his portrait will go. There should be two other blank spaces. Instead, there’s just silence. Nothingness. “That’s where they belong. They were heroes too.”

“They were.” Iverson’s gaze burns a hole into Shiro’s cheek. “Were, Shirogane. You survived what they didn’t.”

Shiro sighs. “Yeah. I know.”

It still feels odd, months later, to have crash landed in the desert in a ship that doesn’t belong to Earth. It feels weird to lie about it to the public, and to say that he crashed in his ship’s long-range escape pod instead. It feels terrifying to have no memory of anything that happened after he left Earth for Kerberos. It feels worse to think about what happened to the Holts, and why it didn’t happen to Shiro too.

Iverson knocks him out of his reverie by saying, “This is your address for tomorrow. We’re sending you to one of our contractors. You’re getting the royal treatment, as ordered by high command.” Iverson hands Shiro a pad that glows with coordinates. “He’s the best damn painter this side of the desert.” He points a thumb over his shoulder to the portrait of the admiral. “See that? That’s his work.”

The painting...well, on first glance, Shiro will admit that he didn’t think it was a painting. Admiral Sanda’s eyes have the same steely shine that they do in real life, and the dark fabric of her uniform is rendered down to the weave of the cloth. If Shiro reaches out, he’s convinced that he’d feel the fabric instead of the canvas, or the wiry strands of her perfectly coiffed hair. Whoever this painter is, he’s good. Shiro says as much.

“Yeah, he’s a real miracle worker.”

Something in his tone sounds like muted disdain. Shiro asks, “Everything okay?”

“I will warn you, Shirogane. He’s...” Iverson trails off, which is entirely unlike him. 

Shiro raises an eyebrow. “He’s what?”

“Difficult.”

It sounds almost like a challenge.

Shiro likes those.

 

* * *

 

When Shiro parks his hoverbike at the specified address, his first thought is  _ oh. _

There’s not much here.

For starters, there wasn’t an address given so much as a set of coordinates and a few landmarks. And, okay, Shiro’s a pilot and he can navigate, but he’d thought that most people had recorded residences in this day and age. But here he is in front of this small, run-down cabin in the desert, and he’s pretty sure he’s not at the wrong place. It’s the only building for miles around, and there’s not even a mailbox to be seen. 

Shiro takes his goggles off and hangs them over the handlebar. There’s no point in locking them up; he’s assuming that nobody’s going to come and steal them while he’s getting his portrait painted. Nobody’s out on the little porch waiting for him, so it seems like he’ll have to make the formal approach this time. No painter is too difficult for him to deal with.  _ You’re Takashi Shirogane, miracle pilot. You can get your picture painted. No big deal. _

He straightens his uniform and braces himself for whatever Iverson has led him to dread. Everything is totally under control.

Something gleams from an adjacent garage, though, and Shiro wanders closer. He’s early; it won’t hurt to take a peek. There’s a hoverbike parked just inside, resting on the ground. Shiro admires it from outside the door, hungrily taking in the details of its form. It’s well maintained, and clearly has seen some use. It brings up a pang of longing in Shiro’s chest; he’s not had the chance to ride his own hoverbike nearly enough. Today is the first he’s ridden it since returning from the Kerberos mission.

Is it too presumptuous to ask if this painter likes to race?

Shiro resolves to save a question like that for at least an hour in, when he’s gotten a good feel of what this guy is like. 

Behind him, the clouds must shift for a moment, because a new shaft of sunlight comes streaking down into the garage, picking up a new glint of steel. Curious, Shiro moves closer. There’s something else in there: dark gray metal and purple-red accents, peeking out from below a tarp. The colors don’t bring up any particular memories in this configuration, but a phantom chill runs down Shiro’s spine.

Maybe he should remember.

He’s tempted to shoulder his way into the garage and check out the bike and the odd metal. The combination of them rattles around in the part of his mind that swears it remembers the Kerberos mission. 

And Shiro almost goes.

That would surely be trespassing, though, and Shiro’s not about to start off on the wrong foot with a painter who’s apparently known for being difficult. Politeness and routine push him backwards from the open garage door and its intriguing secrets. Reluctantly, Shiro steps away from the garage and closer to the house. Though run-down, it’s in decent condition. Someone’s been taking care of it.

His feet creak on the old wood of the porch stairs. Surprised, he looks down at his feet, testing the give there. It’s been ages since he’s encountered anything quite this old. Is it authentic, or is it one of those faux-vintage constructions that the wealthy seem so fond of? Curiously, Shiro runs his living hand along the railing, wincing when he comes away with a splinter after a moment. Okay, so it’s definitely real wood. Super authentic.

Cursing softly, he sucks on the wound in his thumb, tasting the faint iron hint of blood. It’s fine; he can work past this. Bad building maintenance is not an omen of a bad painting experience. Positive thoughts only. He waits until the bleeding has stopped and wanders the rest of the way across the porch towards the still-quiet house.

He knocks on the wooden door. It rattles a little bit under his prosthetic fist, and he winces.  _ Don’t break the painter’s door before you meet him,  _ his mind supplies helpfully, and he gently encourages his inner monologue to shut up.

There’s no answer at first. No voice calls out to him that they’ll be there in a moment, but there is a rustle and creak from within that suggests life. But there aren’t any footsteps.

Shiro looks around. The windows are all covered, and he’s not about to start hollering in the middle of the desert, so he supposes this will have to be a waiting game. He sighs.

Thirty seconds is the appropriate amount of time to wait, right?

It swings open right as he raises his hand to knock again, and Shiro locks eyes with the artist he’s about to spend several hours with.

Iverson had said this guy was difficult.

He never said he was hot.

That’s the simple way to describe him. The painter - if this is really him - wears a red and white jacket that rides high along his ribcage, a tight gray shirt, and dark pants. And the boots.  _ Wow, those are nice boots.  _ Black and white and red, and all three look good on him. So does the gray in the shirt. Come to think of it, Shiro doesn’t think that any color could look bad in this guy.

That’s not even counting everything about his face. He’s got wide dark eyes, bone structure that could probably kill a model, and lips that are currently definitely, definitely not in an amused expression.

Shiro starts mentally compiling a list of all of these things for future reference.

He must be staring, because the artist frowns. Or keeps frowning. “Yeah?” he asks without much ceremony or deference at all, and  _ oh god,  _ his voice is now added to the list.

Shiro finds himself investigating the finer details of the shadows this man’s hair casts along his cheekbones. “I, uh.” Well, he didn’t exactly mean to start using his voice, but it seems like he’s committed to it now. He holds his right hand out, remembering his manners. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m-”

“I know,” the painter interrupts. “Commander Takashi Shirogane.”

Shiro hesitates, then smiles. “Yeah. That’s me.”

The painter studies him for a moment, gaze completely inscrutable. He takes Shiro’s hand; he doesn’t seem to mind that it’s made of synthetic alloys instead of skin and bone. That’s a relief, at least. “Keith.”

“Keith...?” He hopes that his inflection is clear enough.

It is, and Keith’s scowl deepens. “Just Keith.” He lets go of Shiro’s hand and stalks off into the house.

Shiro stands at the threshold of the house and rubs at the back of his neck. There wasn’t really an invitation extended, and Shiro wasn’t raised in a barn. Wait, but maybe this guy was? Do little farm houses in the middle of the desert count as barns? Nobody really makes houses out of wood anymore, especially not out here where the heat and the dryness make it a fire hazard. Maybe there was a good reason.

“Are you going to come in?” Keith asks from further within the house.

“Oh!” So it was an invitation. Shiro hurries through the door and almost trips over the threshold. He doesn’t, and that’s enough of a victory for him.

The house is just as small on the inside as Shiro had expected. It opens up into a living space with old sketches pinned to the wall and the curtains half-drawn over unwashed windows. A couch and armchair sit there too, secondhand and old but still cared for. There doesn’t seem to be any dust collecting on them, so it must be well lived-in.

All in all, it feels like a home. Shiro’s not been to one of those in years.

He’d had one, maybe, before Kerberos, but the memories of that time are just as hard to recall as the ones right after, though for a different reason entirely.

It’s not worth it to be thinking of things like that right now.

“Sit over there, Commander.” Keith points to the armchair in the corner. The corner looks like it’s the cleanest place in the whole house, or at least what Shiro’s seen of it. The chair is well-worn but still nice dark leather; now that Shiro looks at it, it’s clear that it’s meant to complement the grays and yellows of Garrison uniforms. Shiro runs his flesh-and-blood hand along the arm of it, admiring the texture of it after so long in the clinical standard-issue interiors of the Garrison’s quarters. He sits, only barely managing to stifle the pleased sigh at how plush it is.

“They all do that,” Keith says.

Shiro looks at him in surprise. “Who does what?”

“The officers. When they come here for the portraits, they love the chair.” He shrugs. “Guess your Garrison doesn’t invest in good seating.”

“Definitely not,” Shiro agrees, sinking as far into the chair as he can manage. As it turns out, he can manage a lot.

“Do you want some water?” Keith asks. “We’re gonna be here a while.”

That’s generous of him. Shiro almost says no out of reflexive politeness, but he figures he’s going to need it if the painter recommends it. “Yeah. Thanks. I’d like that.”

Keith nods firmly and disappears into the kitchen. “Should be no more than four, depending on how quickly I can get satisfied with the sketch. I like to make sure I get most of the broad strokes of the painting done before the subject leaves, and then add finishing touches later. You don’t have anywhere to be, right, Commander?”

Shiro shakes his head, then realizes that Keith can’t see him. “Nope,” he affirms aloud. “Free all day. And. Uh. You can call me Shiro, you know.” Shiro rubs at the back of his neck. “Y’know, since we’ll be working together for a bit on this.”

From the kitchen, Keith peeks in. His hands tangle in his own hair, gathering it backwards and up in a loose knot at the back of his head. It exposes the finer features of his face, taking them out of shadow, and Shiro knows that these are about to be the longest few hours of his life. Keith says, “To be honest, I think I’ll be doing most of the work, but-” He makes a wordless noise of acceptance. “Call it what you will.” His head disappears back into the kitchen, and Shiro immediately puts his head in his hands. Nothing is going to work on this guy. He seems immune to friendliness, or at least he gives that impression. Maybe he does absorb it, but he chooses to channel the returning energy into hostility instead.

It’s a shame he’s so pretty as well. Shiro’s good at dealing with unpleasant people, but his powers of tolerance are severely depleted when he’s otherwise distracted. 

Okay. He’s endured worse than this. He can sit still and look pretty for a few hours and then go home and forget all about this day. And then in a few weeks they’ll have the gala and they’ll unveil his portrait and everyone will call him  _ hero  _ to his face and then whisper behind his back.

It’ll be great.

Shiro scowls and diverts his attention to the art pinned up on the walls. They’re sketches, mostly, and incredible ones at that. He recognizes a few of them as officers of the Garrison. None of them seem much older than a year or two, though; none of the officers that left the service during Shiro’s time away on the Kerberos mission seem to be captured in Keith’s style. He must be new to the Garrison’s service. 

There are a few non-human studies there too. Cats, or at least their eyes, with slit pupils and hungry expressions. Even in the black and white of charcoal on paper, they glow out at him. Shiro turns in his seat, eager to get a look at some more of the pictures.

“Here.”

Shiro nearly jumps out of his skin; he hadn’t heard Keith come back into the room. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Keith’s free hand jerk in surprise, reaching for something behind his back. “Fuck. Uh. Sorry.” There’s a flash of something in the hand - metal, maybe, but it’s gone before Shiro can process it - and then it returns to his side. With his other hand, Keith offers him a glass of water. “Didn’t mean to startle you.”

“It’s fine.” Shiro sits back in the chair, accepting the water. It’s got a single, sad ice cube floating in it, but it’ll do. He attempts a smile, trying to get his heart rate back down to normal. “Just a little jumpy, I guess.”

Keith nods curtly and turns on his heel once the water has been successfully delivered. He heads back to where an easel sits not far from the chair. Shiro takes the opportunity to study the back part of Keith’s form while taking a sip of the barely-chilled water. He’s slim, and the jacket kind of hangs on him, but there’s muscle under there for sure. There’s also something strapped to the back of the heavy belt he’s wearing: a sheath? He clears his throat and asks, “You need a knife out here in the desert?”

There’s a pause in his step. “Coyotes,” is the only answer Shiro gets. Settling in behind the easel, Keith lifts a canvas onto the wooden slats of it and arranges it how he wants. He looks around it to meet Shiro’s eyes, examines him critically, and says, “Sit up.”

“Yes, sir.”

Keith stops and actually looks at him, and there’s a curious set to his mouth. He says, “Don’t call me that.”

Okay. None of this is going well. Shiro holds his hands up in an offer of surrender and says, “Sorry. Force of habit.” He shrugs. “Garrison training really gets to you, y’know?”

“Yeah, you never forget some things,” Keith says. “Muscle memory and all that.” Once more, he looks at Shiro, scanning him with a gaze that makes Shiro want to squirm out of his skin. The reporters’ scrutiny was bad enough when he woke up back on Earth; this painter  _ sees _ him. “Hold still.” Keith twirls his pencil in his hand, and for the first time, something like a smile curves his lips. It looks good on him. “I guess you’re used to that, though. Standing to attention.”

Frowning, Shiro straightens up a little bit. He was slouching, maybe. “Sorry.”

“No worries. It’s not the end of the world.” Tapping his pencil against his lips, Keith studies Shiro closely. “I’m gonna sketch you with this first, and then I’ll paint it. Sound good?”

Shiro agrees, and he sits up as straight as he can, and Keith gets to work.

The sound of Keith’s pencil over the canvas is soothing enough that Shiro finds himself relaxing. Normally he wouldn’t trust silence so absolute; it brings up uncomfortable feelings from the blank spot in his mind he can’t remember. Silence feels like waiting. It feels like dread. But in this house, warm and rustic with another body sharing his space, Shiro lets himself relax. There’s nothing clinical and clean about this. It’s...human. It’s nice. As much as he likes the Garrison and its smooth lines, it turns suffocating after a while. Coming out here in the desert feels like a nice vacation.

And Keith’s not as difficult as Iverson said. Standoffish, maybe, but he’s not cruel or averse to human interaction. 

But they’re only just beginning, of course. He could show his true colors. 

_ Nice,  _ Shiro’s inner monologue comments.  _ Because he’s a painter. _

Shiro sighs.

He’s trying to be optimistic about this. Really.

After a while, Keith says, “I think I got it.”

Shiro perks up. “Can I see the sketch?”

There goes the frown again, pulling the corners of Keith’s mouth into total disapproval. “I don’t share my sketches,” he says, “or works in progress.”

“What about all of these?” Shiro asks, pointing at all of the sketches and drawings nailed to the walls.

Keith starts digging through his materials for paints, setting out grays and yellows and browns. He picks out brushes too, quietly muttering to himself as he prepares the ones he wants. He looks up, though, looking around at his paper and canvas-covered walls, and says, “Oh. Those are all done.”

Shiro nods. “Oh. Okay.” So he won’t ask again. He’s just going to have to trust Keith’s artistic instinct. Iverson called him - what was it? - a miracle worker, so Shiro’s settles in and waits for the miracle to start happening.

Keith starts off with broad strokes, laying down bold stripes of color onto the canvas. He’s not going too slowly, but it’s not as if he’s rushing either. Nevertheless, his work has an easy cadence to it, and Shiro focuses on the metronome sight of his arm as it drags the brush across the canvas. This sort of order is calming. 

The silence, though, could be filled. Keith’s not threatening at all, but Shiro still wants to try to break the tension.

So why not start off a bit of conversation?

“Nice bike.”

Keith makes a quiet noise of acknowledgement and keeps painting. 

Then he pauses.

Furrows his brow.

Distantly, Shiro thinks,  _ Fuck. _

Keith asks, “Wait, when did you see my bike?”

“It’s in the garage,” Shiro replies weakly. “I just took a peek.”

Something dark crosses Keith’s face. “Need to close that up,” he mutters, more to himself than to Shiro. 

“Do you ride...bikes?” 

_ Oh my god, Takashi Shirogane, you absolute moron. _

He decides to never talk again.

Keith stares at him for a long moment and then looks down at his palette, picking up some more paint. He raises it back to the canvas without another word, and maybe that’s for the best.

Back to the painting. Shiro deeply regrets that he’s the subject, because blending into this armchair is definitely what he’d like to be doing right now. But Keith doesn’t seem to have taken it to heart, and gradually the silence becomes less forced and more natural. Shiro carefully cracks his neck to relieve the stiffness that’s building up. Keith asks him quietly if he’s okay, and Shiro tells him yes, and the silence begins anew. Comfortable, or as close to that as the two of them are going to get.

When he gathers his dignity up from where he’s scattered it, Shiro ventures, “Well, then, where’d you learn to paint?”

Keith’s eyes go soft and wistful, and Shiro knows he’s picked the right topic. “My, uh. My mom raised me all over the place. We met a lot of people. I picked up some stuff along the way.”

Shiro raises an eyebrow. “Anywhere I’d know?”

For a moment, it almost seems like Keith scowls. It wouldn’t be entirely unexpected from what Shiro knows of him, but after the thoughtfulness of his expression, it’s jarring. But the frown smooths back out after a moment, and Keith shakes his head, staring at Shiro before he returns to his work. “Uh. No. Kind of obscure places.”

“So you decided to settle down with the Garrison?”

“They hate me, but-” He shrugs. “There’s nobody like me who’s willing to live out in the fucking desert. So I stay here, and they pay me.”

“How long have you worked with them?”

“Long enough. Year or two.”

“So we started at the same time,” Shiro says. “A couple of rookies.”

There it is again: that hint of a smile. “Yeah,” Keith agrees, mixing a new color on his palette. “Yeah, the fresh meat.” He’s silent for a moment, then adds, “Make sure the older cadets don’t steal your lunch.”

So he can joke. Shiro chuckles; it’s a worn-out joke but a good one. “They’d get a fight.”

“One you’d win.”

Shiro raises an eyebrow. “You think so?”

“I know so,” Keith says, and though there’s a hint of a laugh in his voice, his eyes still remain stony. It’d almost be unnerving if Shiro didn’t already suspect that to be his default face.

“You seem to know an awful lot about the Garrison’s culture for someone who’s not in it.”

“Comes with the territory.” Keith dabs at the gray on his palette and brings his brush up to the canvas, dragging it across in wide strokes. His face goes contemplative, and they lapse into silence once more. Shiro’s fine with watching. There’s enough going on with the way Keith focuses on the canvas for Shiro to be occupied for ages. It goes in cycles. Shiro realizes it after the second time Keith tucks his hair behind his ear. He’s a soldier; he’s trained to see patterns, and he’d never miss one as enticing as this - as mundane as this, as beautiful.

It goes like this:

Keith takes a long look at Shiro, who tries not to stare back at him, but it’s hard when his portrait is meant to make aggressive eye contact and challenge anyone who dares question the promotion of Commander Takashi Shirogane. The stare goes on for just too long, and then Keith scowls and hides behind the canvas. He mixes a color. Spreads it across the canvas. Pauses. Waits. Looks at Shiro again, this time with a far more professional eye, quick and expert and careful. Something gleams in his gaze, and he returns to the canvas with renewed vigor. 

And repeat.

There’s no clock anywhere in here. Shiro’s not sure how long it’s been, and without too much of a view through the windows, it’s not even worth it to try to gauge the passage of time by the sprinting of the sun through the sky. He takes a drink of water when he realizes how dry his throat is.

Somewhere outside, a bird gives a single, mournful cry. Keith’s eyes flick to the window, briefly distracted, before he returns to the canvas. For a moment, the pattern is broken.

But Keith continues.

The silence draws on, and Shiro finds himself locking eyes with Keith each time Keith looks up to check his features. Without words between them, the contact feels unnaturally intimate. He fills the void with a careful question: “So Garrison officials tell you things about the Garrison when you’re painting their portraits?”

A short nod; Keith’s hair dips past his eyes, and he flicks it out of the way with the back end of his brush. “You wouldn’t believe the things people say when they think they’re safe to speak their minds.”

Shiro frowns. “Are they not?”

Keith meets his eyes. He amends, “No. They are, it’s just...y’know. Interesting to hear what they have to say. About life, about work, about space. All that stuff.”

“Do you ever say anything back?”

“‘Course I do. I’m not a brick wall. So we talk.”

Shiro quickly raises a hand to scratch at his ear, putting it back down hopefully before Keith notices and chastises him for it. He hopes his position hasn’t changed too much. “What do you say when they talk about space?” he asks. He knows there’s an eagerness from the public to move out beyond their small colonies on the Moon and Mars. He knows that, even now, people still gossip about the tragedy of Kerberos, and how the pilot made an error but returned anyway, and how none of it makes sense.

Of course it doesn’t. It’s all a lie.

Shiro wants to know if Keith thinks so too.

Keith’s gaze shifts to the still-covered windows, staring towards a sky neither of them can see. “Just...asking what they think about how it looks out there. What it feels like to look down on a planet and call it home.” A small, half-broken smile tips up the edges of his lips, and he looks back at Shiro. The open, vulnerable beauty of his expression takes Shiro’s breath away.

Shiro wets his lips and says, “It’s the best feeling. I, uh. I still remember my first flight.”

The smile grows, or at least it changes, turning wide and easy and soft. “Don’t we all?” he asks, and then pauses. His gaze ticks back towards the canvas, and he adds, “Metaphorically speaking, y’know.”

“Yeah,” Shiro agrees. “There’s always something. You never forget your first time doing anything.”

Keith raises his brush a little bit in a gentle parody of a toast. “To first times, then.”

Shiro reaches for his own half-full glass of water - the ice cube has long since melted, but he doesn’t mind - and raises it in return. “To first times,” he echoes, and he takes a sip.

There’s nothing for Keith to drink, but he taps the end of the brush against his own lips to mimic the action; Shiro’s eyes follow the motion. Keith’s lips are pretty too, in a revelation that surprises nobody. They part a bit, holding gently onto the end of the brush as Keith returns his attention to the painting. It’s surely a subconscious gesture, and Keith doesn’t even seem aware that he’s doing it.

He’s glad the water is still in his hand, and he takes another sip.

It doesn’t really help.

Keith stares back at him, brush caught between his lips, and smiles.

_ Oh my god. _

He does know what he’s doing.

Shiro needs more water.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keith knows that purple is Shiro's color.

“What do you do when you’re not painting?”

Keith shrugs, sitting back against his stool while he mixes up a new color. “Sketch, sometimes. Exercise. Work on my bike.” He looks up from his work with an eyebrow quirked up. “You saw the bike already.”

Shiro’s cheeks grow warm. “Sorry.”

“What’s the saying?” Keith asks, carefully adding some more of a brownish color to his paint concoction. “Something about a...a bridge?” He looks up, brow furrowed. “Right?”

“Water under the bridge?”

The paint-covered utensil jabs in his direction. “Right!” Keith says with complete satisfaction. “Yeah, that. Good.” He waves the brush around in vague triumph. “You have a bike too, yeah? That’s how you got here?”

“Yup.”

“You ride...bikes?” he asks, and there’s that wicked grin again, unhindered now by the paintbrush.

Shiro’s heart sinks, and he realizes that he is completely and utterly in over his head.

This is what he gets for taking on a challenge.

“I - yeah. I’ve been known to.” He ducks his head, then recalls the idea he’d had earlier. “Hey wait, do you race? You probably know the desert about as well as I do.”

Keith’s eyebrows go up. “I’ve never really had someone to race with since I moved here.”

“Is that a yes?”

“To racing together?” Keith smiles. “Sure. I finally get to see how the Garrison’s golden boy flies.”

The acceptance has Shiro’s heart fluttering with excitement. “That’s awesome, yeah. It’s not really flying, but it’s close enough.” He pauses. “It’s all they’ll let me do.”

There’s a pause, and then Keith asks, “The Garrison doesn’t let you fly anymore?” There’s something like an edge in his voice, like thinly veiled frustration.

Shiro shakes his head, frowning. “Not since I got back.” Apparently, losing all memory of a year’s disappearance in deep space makes a pilot unqualified for flying. He can’t say he exactly blames the Garrison for the decision, but he yearns to see the stars again. But maybe it’s for the best. Broken pilots shouldn’t be trusted to defy the natural gravity of their home. “Y’know, most people would be grilling me about what happened by now.”

Keith regards him with an artist’s critical gaze. “The Kerberos mission,” he says. So he does know. “Did you want me to?”

Shiro hesitates. “I don’t know,” he admits. “I guess I expected you to.”

“Oh.” Keith looks at his painting, then back at Shiro. “Then I won’t.”

Carefully, confusedly, Shiro repeats, “Oh.” He blinks, dropping his gaze for a moment. He’s pretty sure he’s not disappointed. It’s just that nobody’s ever let the topic go like that. Most people outside the Garrison - and plenty in it as well - would probably kill to get the chance to talk to the only man to survive the trek to their solar system’s outer reaches. “Thank you,” he says, but he’s not sure how loud he’s even being. Hopefully Keith will hear him.

Something warm blooms in his chest that feels like gratitude.

He smiles, then quells it for the sake of the painting.

“I have your expression,” Keith says softly.

Shiro furrows his brows. “What?”

Keith gestures with the brush like he’s trying to paint out what he means. “Your expression. I’ve got the broad strokes of it, y’know? And I’m not working on that part right now. You can smile if you want. I don’t mind.”

Shiro hesitates.

“Really,” Keith insists. “I don’t.” 

Tentatively, Shiro lets the smile creep its way across his face again. Cheerfulness is a familiar enough emotion to show, and it’s comfortable to slip into in times like this. It’s easy to smile when he’s so at home in his own skin in this place. There aren’t any questions in the desert, or at least none that scare him.

Keith grants him with a returning grin of his own. “There it is.”

Maybe Shiro’s just projecting, but he almost thinks that Keith’s happy to see him smile.

So he keeps the expression. It’s not even like he has to try too hard. 

He finds himself staring at the way Keith furrows his brow to add a new feature to the painting. With every time that Keith glances back at him to study how he looks, their gazes catch and linger on each other for longer and longer. Shiro swallows, and Keith’s eyes tick down to watch him, and then he mirrors the motion. Over and over and over.

This isn’t a pattern that Shiro’s used to.

It might be minutes and it might be hours, but Shiro can’t take it anymore.

“Hey, Keith?”

Keith’s tongue peeks out from between his lips, wetting them carefully. Shiro can’t help but stare. “Yeah?” he asks after what must have only been five seconds, though it feels like centuries and not nearly long enough. 

“How’s that painting going?” He’s not sure how much longer he can sit here; he’s getting distracted.

“These colors are all so boring,” Keith laments. “No offense to you or your skin tone or anything, but. You know. Skin and hair and uniforms don’t offer much.”

Shiro snorts, “Yeah, let me just become a blue-skinned alien and we’ll call it even.”

Keith teases, “I can arrange that.”

“Wouldn’t put it past you.”

“You know what does have an interesting color, though?” Keith asks.

“Hm?”

Softly, Keith says, “It’s weird, but, uh. Your eyes.” He ducks his head, and a blush colors his cheeks. It’s a fascinating color: rosy, verging on a cooler shade that’s more like lavender than anything. Shiro’s never seen anything like it, and he’s determined to get Keith to do it again.

For now, though, he’s stunned enough to ask, “Really?”

“I’ve never seen eyes like yours,” Keith admits. “I have no idea how I’ll paint them.” He seems to have an internal battle, then sets down his brushes and stalks across the room towards Shiro. Shiro shrinks backwards, staring up at Keith as he approaches and stands right in front of the armchair. Keith’s tongue darts out to lick his lips once more. “It’s hard to tell what color they are from a distance.”

So here he is. Shiro fights the urge to reach out and pull Keith in close. It would be so easy, really. “Well, you’re right here now,” he manages to say.

Keith grins, and his smile is even more radiant up close. “Call it research.”

Shiro blinks, and he’s quietly pleased to see the way Keith’s gaze locks onto his, following the slow sweep of his eyelashes. Shiro’s sure he’s blinked millions of times before, but he’s sure that it’s never felt as important as this. He says, “They’re just eyes.” And not special ones either. He’s lucky that whatever scarred his nose didn’t get an inch higher and blind him. Then he would really be useless to the Garrison. His eyes are for flying and for fighting, and that’s always been the truth.

But Keith doesn’t seem to think so. He bends down, bracing himself on the arms of the chair, staring down into Shiro’s eyes. He doesn’t say anything, and for a few tense, insane moments, they just look at each other, held apart by inches or miles of space. He’s close enough to touch, if Shiro would just lean up to meet him, but at the same time he’s light years away. He’s not close enough because the only way he could be is if he’s in Shiro’s arms. The realization hits him hard, and he swallows, hardly daring to blink again for fear that he’ll miss some nuance in Keith’s expression.

Another agonizing heartbeat-turned-hour, and Keith says, “Not just eyes. It’s the color. Sometimes they’re gray, and sometimes they’re brown. Even now, it’s hard to tell.” 

“That happens sometimes,” Shiro says, because he’s not sure he’s capable of coming up with a clever response when Keith is so close. 

“They’re a painter’s dream,” Keith says with wonder coloring his tone. “You’re impossible, did you know that? I’ve met millions of people from all over, but somehow you’re the perfect subject.”

Shiro’s heart lurches a bit at the praise. “You don’t-”

“I do,” Keith insists firmly. “You might say I’m wrong, but I think you’re amazing. I know I just met you and all, but I’m not blind and I’m not dumb. I know a good person when I see one.” Keith leans closer. “Take the compliment.”

“Paint one gray and the other brown,” Shiro suggests. “Then you don’t have to choose.”

Keith smiles, or at least his eyes do, crinkling up until all Shiro can see is the dark shine of them, and how wide his pupils are. “Well, that would just be lazy,” he murmurs, “and I don’t do things halfway.”

On his next exhale, sharing Keith’s warmth, Shiro tells him, “Prove it.”

And Keith does.

He surges forward, raising a knee to brace it on the seat beside Shiro’s thigh, and raises a hand to hold Shiro by the back of the neck. He leans down, and Shiro rises to meet him.

Chastely at first, Shiro kisses Keith, acquainting himself with the soft warmth of his lips. Keith’s the one to make the next move, carefully pressing forward until Shiro opens his mouth to welcome him.

Shiro lets out a soft, pleased noise. It’s been ages since he’s kissed anyone, and it’s never been quite like this. Keith kisses like he’s cataloguing every detail, firm and purposeful and bold. 

They stop for air when neither of them can wait any longer, and Shiro’s loathe to leave him. Neither is Keith, apparently: he leaves his forehead pressed against Shiro’s. His eyes are still closed, showing up close how long his eyelashes are when they brush down towards his cheekbones. He’s impossible. Shiro doesn’t know how he got so lucky.

Wordlessly, Shiro tilts his head up, searching out Keith once more. This second kiss is more hurried and less exploratory; now that Shiro knows what it’s like to kiss Keith, he never wants to stop doing it. His tongue slides alongside Keith’s.

This is the most noise Keith has made in the hours they’ve known each other; he breathes quiet sounds of pleasure into Shiro’s mouth, humming when Shiro moves away from his lips to his neck. Each sound is more satisfied than the rest, and they only serve to encourage Shiro further.

Keith pushes on Shiro’s chest, forcing him to lean backwards. Shiro resists at first, but Keith follows him back, and his back hits the plush back of the armchair. Keith balances and raises his second leg up so that both of his legs are bracketing Shiro’s, and he settles into Shiro’s lap like he belongs there.

Maybe he does.

“You’d look good in purple,” Keith tells him when they part again, and he picks up a tube of paint from a tub on the floor, turning it over in his hands. “Lavender, right here.” He runs a thumb along Shiro’s cheekbone, right where the scar ends. “Everywhere, really. It suits you.”

“Your eyes are purple,” Shiro blurts suddenly, because he’s just realized it. Keith’s eyes gleam a color far beyond dark blue: they shift with the light, first the color of steel and then storm clouds and then the sky long after sunset. They’re violet and starshine-blue, and Shiro thinks that he’s never seen a color like that in the whole universe. He’s jumped between planets and walked without gravity, but he’s never experienced this. He’s never experienced Keith. He asks, “Is that why you think it suits me?”

Keith smiles for real this time, and that just makes his eyes even more unreal. “It might be,” he admits. 

“Then do it,” Shiro says, because he’s pretty sure he’d let Keith do anything if he asked. “Show me.”

Keith laughs, low and breathy, and Shiro adds that to the ever-growing list of things he loves about this impossible painter in the middle of the desert. “Gonna commission me?” he asks, but he pops the cap on the paint tube anyway. Something about the motion has Shiro’s heart racing, and he’s incredibly aware of the warm weight of Keith in his lap. 

“What about my painting?” Shiro asks.

“It needs to dry. This is a passion project.” Keith leans in and kisses him again, and when he comes back, his lips are red and shining. That looks good on him too; red is his color, after all. “Hold still.” He squeezes a bit of the paint out onto his first two fingers, spreading around it with his thumb while staring straight at Shiro. Then, with infinite care, he reaches out and slowly presses his fingers to the high arch of Shiro’s cheekbone. “Right here,” he murmurs. 

Shiro lets his eyes slip shut, taking in the sensation of cool paint against his skin. Is he flushed? His cheeks run hot beneath Keith’s touch, and it’s certainly more than the temperature of the paint.

“Keith,” he sighs before he realizes he’s saying it aloud, and his hips roll up of their own accord, seeking more than just pressure.

“Fuck,” Keith stutters, and his fingers slip, and he falls forward against Shiro’s chest, catching himself one-handed.

That hand is still holding the paint tube, and it explodes.

It’s not particularly violent, but it’s surprising nonetheless. Uncapped and under pressure, the paint has nowhere to go but out, bursting in a rush of pale lavender all over Shiro, Keith, and Shiro’s very finely pressed Garrison uniform.

Into the stunned silence that follows, Keith says, “Fuck.”

Shiro can’t help it: he laughs. 

“Your uniform,” Keith laments, eyes wide with horror. “Oh my god, Shiro, I’m so sorry. The Garrison’s gonna kill me; I’ll pay for the cleaning or whatever you need. This is all my fault. Lemme-” He cuts himself off, already leaning back to go rushing off to god knows where.

On desperate instinct, Shiro reaches out and catches him, holding him by the hips to keep him where he is. He blurts, “I can get a new one.”

Keith blinks. “Can you really?” His thumb traces along Shiro’s cheekbone, spreading paint along with it.

“Yeah. Yeah, of course.” He’s not actually sure. The Garrison might not replace it, and he’ll have a paint covered uniform forever.

He also doesn’t care.

“Fuck. Okay, then.” Keith kisses him again, open-mouthed and hungry, and asks, “Then what are we waiting for?”

That’s all Shiro needs to hear. He leans in to get a taste of Keith’s skin; along the column of his neck, his skin holds a hint of salt, proof of the oppressive heat of the desert all around them. “Bedroom?” he asks. If they’re going to do this, they’re going to do this right.

Keith grinds down experimentally, and Shiro feels it for sure: Keith wants this as badly as he does. “Yeah,” Keith agrees. “Yeah, bedroom.”

“Here.” Shiro slides his hands beneath Keith’s thighs, and Keith makes a pleased sound deep in his chest that has Shiro shivering. “Hold on.” He stands, lifting Keith with him. He’s light enough that it’s not a problem.

Keith tucks his face into Shiro’s neck with a pleased laugh, wrapping his legs firmly around his waist for support. The cool slide of something wet against his neck lets Shiro know that the paint is indeed getting everywhere, but it’s kind of fun, especially when it’s accompanied by the sloppy, wet heat of Keith’s lips along the line of his veins.

It’s not hard to find the bedroom in a house as small as Keith’s, and Shiro makes it with only a little bit of difficulty. The difficulty is Keith’s mouth at his jaw, kissing fire up towards his ear, and the way he purrs Shiro’s name. With Keith’s lips so close, the sound of his name is intoxicating, and Shiro’s half tempted to just press them up against a wall and take care of Keith right here and now.

But Shiro wants to savor this. 

So he brings them into the bedroom, setting Keith down onto the mattress, and tries to force his brain to remember what comes next.

Keith sprawls back on the bed sheets, chest heaving, and stares up at Shiro. “We doing this?” he asks.

“Yes,” Shiro says without hesitation. “Yes.”

Keith shifts upward towards the headboard and sets something onto the bedside table, wrapped in cloth and leather. It looks vaguely like a knife’s sheath, familiar from earlier, but Shiro doesn’t have it in him to care. If Keith wanted to harm him, he would have already. Already, he trusts him.

Keith holds up the lavender paint tube that he brought with him. “I’m keeping this,” he warns, voice a low growl that sends heat to coil low in Shiro’s belly.

Shiro nods frantically. “Yes. Yeah. Okay.”

Keith tosses him another feral grin and starts taking off his boots and tossing them off to the side of the bed. Then comes the jacket, and then his gray shirt, and Keith is shirtless before him.

Shiro stares.

He might not be in the Garrison, but Keith’s built like a warrior. He’s just as lean and well-muscled as Shiro had suspected he was, but not with the same visible strength of Shiro. Where Shiro’s broad, Keith’s slim, all angles and hard planes of muscle and not much else. It’s easy to see what he does when he’s not painting, though: Keith has the muscles of a gymnast and a swordsman. 

Maybe fending off coyotes in the desert is hard work.

Shiro doesn’t have the presence of mind to worry about the finer details of Keith’s leisure time. 

While Keith strips off his pants, Shiro throws his own jacket off to the side, not caring where it lands or if it’s going to get wrinkled, because it surely is. If he’s getting a new uniform, then he might as well destroy it thoroughly. Next come his shoes, and then his pants, and then, carefully, before he loses his nerve, he takes off his shirt. With every inch of skin he reveals, he’s hyper aware of each and every scar that he bares with it. There are too many of them to count, overlapping in some places in a combination of old and older remnants of some pain he can’t remember.

Keith stretches and leaves the bed, standing to watch Shiro. “Knew it,” he murmurs.

Shiro pauses. “Knew what?” He holds the shirt close, clenching it between his fingers. The fabric strains and stretches against the pressure from his metal fingers. This is a risk, like so many things are: the scars could mean anything, and Keith’s guess is as good as Shiro’s. He can handle curiosity. He doesn’t know if he can bear Keith’s pity.

Keith smiles and steps forward, and he traces the line of a long white scar with a paint-covered thumb, spreading lavender across it. The paint is cold even after being close to Keith’s skin, and Shiro shudders at the touch.

But maybe that’s not just the paint.

“You’re beautiful,” Keith tells him simply. 

“Keith-”

“Perfect subject,” Keith says, repeating his praise from earlier. Shiro squeezes his eyes shut at the words. “I want to paint you a million ways, Shiro.”

He takes Shiro by the shoulders, maneuvering him around until the backs of his knees hit the bed. Shiro sucks in a breath, and Keith drags him down into another kiss. Shiro groans, pulling Keith flush against him, and Keith laughs against his lips before forcing Shiro down onto the bed. It’s shocking how thoroughly he’s able to press Shiro into the mattress and hold him down as he climbs into his lap. Keith’s got an easy strength, like he’s barely trying.

It’s not easy for anyone to pin Shiro; he’s too strong for most of the cadets he trains with. That Keith can so effortlessly put him in his place makes him twitch in his underwear beneath Keith, and he breathes out Keith’s name in a plea.

“I know,” Keith soothes, and he places a kiss at the juncture of Shiro’s neck and shoulder, dragging his paint-covered fingers from Shiro’s shoulders to the center of his chest. “Fuck, Shiro, you’re so gorgeous.”

“Keith.”

“Take the compliment.”

“No paint on the arm,” Shiro warns instead.

“Sure. Sure.” Keith ducks his head, though, and presses a line of open-mouthed kisses along the juncture of skin and alloy. The sensitivity has Shiro throwing his head back with a groan, torn between pulling away and begging Keith to do that again. He must make a truly embarrassing noise, because Keith smiles against his skin.

“Keith, you’re being a tease,” he says, rutting up to meet Keith’s hips. They’re both still in their underwear, and Shiro’s desperate for the friction of skin on skin, unhindered by fabric. 

“I could use a brush,” Keith breathes against his neck, grinding down on Shiro, “if you think that would help.” 

“I don’t think I care.”

“These sheets are gonna be a mess.”

“Good,” Shiro growls, and he pulls Keith down against him, desperate for friction.

A rough, surprised sound comes from deep in Keith’s chest. “Shiro.”

On an exhale, Shiro begs, “Keith.”

“Take these off,” Keith orders, tugging at the waistband of Shiro’s underwear. “Now.”

Shiro wouldn’t dare disobey Keith now. He lifts his hips, and Keith climbs off so that they can both get rid of the rest of their clothes. Shiro’s pretty sure he’s never taken off his underwear so quickly in his life. Keith’s back in his lap in a heartbeat, and Shiro kisses him, taking them both in his hand. He strokes them both together, thrusting up to meet Keith in his hand, and Keith responds in kind; they fall in sync easily.

“I have lube,” Keith says breathlessly. “Bedside table. Condom too.”

Shiro nods and reaches over to the bedside table. While he does, Keith lays kisses along his chest, digging paint-covered fingers into his skin. Distracted as he is, Shiro manages to get the drawer of the table open and rummages around for what he needs. He finds a condom packet and bottle of lube with only minor difficulty, and he slams the drawer shut with such force that the table rattles.

The bottle’s half-used already, Shiro notices. How many visitors does Keith get out here in the lonely desert? How many times has he used the lube on himself, all alone out here with nobody to know what he’s doing?

Shiro realizes that he desperately wants to hear how Keith sounds when he falls apart.

Before he loses his nerve, he asks, “Can I?”

Keith’s eyes widen, showing just how dark his pupils are. “Yes. Yes.  _ Please,  _ Shiro.”

As quickly as he can manage, Shiro wipes his hands off on the sheets - he didn’t have much paint on his hands to begin with, but it doesn’t hurt to be sure. He pops the cap on the lube and spreads some lube over the fingers of his human hand. Keith holds his chin with one paint-covered hand and leans down to kiss him again, and Shiro lets him take the lead.

Curiously, he presses a finger against Keith’s entrance, listening for Keith’s answering sigh. When Keith pulls back to breathe a soft  _ yes _ against his lips, Shiro continues. He’s as careful as he can be, spreading one hand over Keith’s hip to hold him steady while he works a finger into him. Keith’s tight, but he relaxes around Shiro’s finger like he’s done this before. He probably has.

There are the wandering images in Shiro’s head again of Keith all alone in bed, spreading himself open, and he resolves to replace that imaginary scenario with a real memory of Keith falling apart.

Keith is perfect like this, bowed over Shiro’s chest, tracing aimless violet patterns on his skin while Shiro works him open. “Another,” he breathes, trying to sink down further.

Shiro holds him up with his free hand. “Hey,” he warns. “Take this slow.”

He’s not prepared for the nearly murderous look Keith gives him. Keith hisses, “Shiro,” with such desperation that Shiro’s fingers stutter and stop inside him. “Please.”

He can’t say no; Shiro adds another finger, and Keith hums in approval.

They continue in a similar way, and soon enough Keith demands the addition of a third finger. Shiro obliges happily.

“Kiss me,” Keith begs, and Shiro strains up to meet him. Keith moans into his mouth when Shiro twists his fingers, and Shiro’s hips jerk up of their own accord; he can’t get enough of the sounds Keith makes. He curls his fingers, testing out the sounds Keith makes with each movement. All of them, as it turns out, are good.

In time, it just becomes Keith rocking down onto Shiro’s fingers, kissing any part of Shiro’s neck that’s not already painted. He muffles soft moans into against Shiro’s throat. Shiro murmurs quiet encouragement in his ear, trying to ignore his own need in favor of making Keith feel as good as possible. It’s gratifying enough to hear his own name being desperately whispered against his skin. Still, when Keith grinds down with more force than Shiro can muster, he gives Shiro all the friction he needs, infrequent as it is.

Keith pulls back from him just enough to say, “I’m ready, Shiro, please,” and that’s all Shiro needs to hear.

He removes his fingers from inside Keith, relishing the soft whine Keith makes in response, and reaches for the condom. He nearly fumbles it in his excitement, but he manages to tear open the package successfully and roll the condom on over himself. He applies more lube to the condom, stroking himself for a moment while Keith watches with wide violet eyes. “Here,” Shiro says, and with his free hand he holds Keith by the hip, guiding him backwards.

Keith raises up on his knees, and Shiro forgets about everything else but this moment. It’s just Keith, staring down at Shiro like a predator, eyes gleaming with determination.

Shiro puts this image of his face right on top of his list of things he loves about Keith.

And then Keith’s eyes slip shut, and he starts to seat himself in Shiro’s lap, and Shiro forgets how to breathe.

“Go slow,” Shiro murmurs, rubbing circles into Keith’s hips with his thumbs. “I don’t wanna hurt you.”

“I know.” Keith bites his bottom lip, but a soft whine escapes him anyway. He sinks down a little further, and Shiro has to make a conscious effort not to thrust up into the tight heat of him. He manages to distract himself by instead wrapping his metal hand around Keith, stroking him back to full hardness. “Shiro,” Keith breathes. He rocks down further, and pleasure blooms electric in Shiro’s stomach.

He says, “You feel incredible, Keith.” God, he means it, too.

Keith smiles down at him breathlessly. “Please move, Shiro.” He braces one hand on Shiro’s hip and leans back, throwing his head back. In the golden daylight that filters into the bedroom, the tense lines of his muscles stand out.

Shiro obeys him without another word, slowly thrusting up while pulling Keith down to meet him. Keith gasps, eyes going violet-wide, and lets Shiro manhandle him. 

He builds up a rhythm, slowly at first, savoring the feeling of Keith all around him. But he needs as much of Keith as he can get, and before long Shiro increases his speed. He’s never been patient, and it doesn’t seem like Keith is either. 

His head falls forward, sending his dark hair tumbling down, and Shiro reaches up on instinct to run his metal fingers through it. 

Keith hums, and the sound trails off into a low groan as Shiro thrusts shallowly up into him. When he braces his hands on Shiro’s chest, he spreads paint across Shiro’s skin, covering pale scars and unmarred tan alike. It’s aimless and accidental, but Shiro cherishes the touch nonetheless.

“More?” he asks breathlessly. “Keith, I-”

“Yeah,” Keith replies on the tail end of a sigh. “C’mon, Shiro, I know you can do more.”

Shiro likes a challenge.

He gathers Keith up in his arms and turns them over, laying Keith on his back in the middle of the paint-stained sheets. Keith’s lips part to let out a laugh, and Shiro takes a moment to admire how he looks like this with his dark hair spread across the pillow in a halo. But he’s desperate for Keith, so he places his hands beneath Keith’s thighs to lift them. Keith’s just as flexible as he hoped, wrapping a leg possessively around Shiro’s waist while Shiro drives into him.

“Shiro,” he moans, pulling Shiro closer with his leg. “I can’t - touch me.”

Of course - his hands are covered in paint. Shiro keeps one hand on Keith’s other leg but drops the other one to where Keith’s cock lies flushed against his stomach, stroking him in rhythm with the movements of his hips. “Like that?” he asks, searching Keith’s face to make sure he’s enjoying this.

Keith nods furiously. “Yeah. Yeah.”

Shiro grins and drops his head, focusing on the perfect heat of Keith around him. This, he thinks, is his favorite pattern of the day.

With a desperate groan, Keith flips them back around and presses down on Shiro’s chest, holding him down against the mattress. He raises up on his knees, and his thigh muscles tense, and then he sinks quickly down again, taking Shiro all the way down. 

Shiro lets his head fall backwards onto the pillow, torn between screwing his eyes shut to enjoy the feeling and taking in every detail of how Keith looks when he rides him. He decides on the latter, reaching a hand up and spreading his fingers against the hard planes of his stomach and trailing his hand up to his chest.

“Shiro,” Keith groans, voice low and rough and wrecked. Shiro’s name sounds like a prayer when he says it. “Shiro, I’m gonna-” One of his hands scrambles down to grab Shiro by the wrist, painting his skin lavender. 

“I’ve got you,” Shiro promises. He’s also close to the edge for sure. With Keith all around him, all over him, holding him down and taking what he wants, Shiro can’t take much more of this. He plants his feet in the sheets, holds Keith by the hips, and thrusts up in earnest, focusing on Keith’s face. He pants into the open air, and Keith bends over to kiss him again.

Keith makes quiet, desperate little sounds as Shiro drives into him, and eventually they start sounding just like Shiro’s name, breathed into the space between them. It’s the final, shaking whisper in Shiro’s ear that pushes him over the edge.

“Keith,” he groans, gripping Keith with enough force to bruise. His hips stutter out of rhythm as he comes. It’s been ages since he’s allowed himself to let go, and it feels perfect like this, with Keith.

Rather than sink down into the sheets, he reaches for Keith, who’s already dripping onto his stomach, and focuses on making Keith feel good too. Keith deserves so, so much.

“Shiro, I -  _ Shiro!”  _ Keith wails.

Shiro twists his wrist on the next upstroke and murmurs, “Let go, Keith.”

That’s all Keith needs. He sinks his teeth into Shiro’s shoulder with a wrecked, shuddering moan. He twitches in Shiro’s hand, hips jerking forward into his grasp, and spills over his fingers and onto Shiro’s stomach. Shiro works him through it, heedless of the sharp pang where Keith’s teeth breach his skin.

What’s another scar next to all the others, after all?

They’re silent for a few long moments, catching their breath in each other’s arms. Keith leaves open-mouthed kisses on Shiro’s shoulder as a soft balm over where he bit him, breathing heavy and hot over his skin. Shiro rubs his thumbs in soothing circles over Keith’s hipbones, taking solace in how solid he is.

Keith rolls off of him; they both make a sound at the overstimulation when they part. Shiro finds enough presence of mind to remove and tie off the condom.

“Trash bin next to you,” Keith tells him softly. 

Shiro mutters something approximating a thank you and leans over the edge of the bed, dropping the condom into the can he finds there. When that’s done, he settles himself back onto the pillows, ignoring the oppressive heat of the desert to slip lower into the covers.

Keith nestles up against his side almost immediately. Shiro’s pleasantly surprised; he didn’t take Keith to be a cuddler. But Keith presses up against him, tossing a leg over Shiro’s, and sighs.

After a moment of consideration, Shiro raises one of his hands to Keith’s head, pushing the stray sweaty strands of his hair so he can comb gently through his dark locks. Keith presses his head up and into the touch, so Shiro takes that as an invitation to keep going. He runs his fingers through the thick fall of Keith’s hair, letting his fingernails drag against skin. He’s always liked it when people have touched his hair; it seems Keith does too.

To his surprise, Keith does more than like it. God, Keith practically purrs beneath him. Or maybe he actually does; the soft rumble of his contentment warms Shiro down to the core, but not with lust. Just comfort. Just satisfaction.

Just Keith.

He holds Keith closer, still scratching idly at the top of his head whenever his fingers get bored of combing through his hair. “Could stay here forever,” he mumbles.

“You can.”

“I can’t.” He wants to, though. “Need to get back to the Garrison to teach.”

“You can use the shower,” Keith tells him sleepily. “You’re covered in paint.”

Shiro shrugs. “It’ll dry.” Already, he can feel it getting tacky on his skin, half-blotted off by the sheets and Keith. Most of it’s dry except for the particularly heavy strokes that Keith made in his more desperate moments. Besides, it’s all mostly underneath where his uniform covers, so he can wait until he gets back to the Garrison to figure out how to wash paint out of his skin before he leads the sparring drills in the morning. He just needs to get rid of whatever’s on his face. “Besides, you said I look good in it.”

Keith smiles. “You do.”

Shiro blushes, but he allows the praise. 

They’re both tired, and eventually Keith settles against his chest. His contented humming turns to softer, deeper breathing. Shiro lets his eyes slip shut.

He’s not quite able to fall asleep - old habits die hard, after all - but it’s nice. It’s peaceful.

Shiro likes this. 

The shadows in the room lengthen after a time, and Shiro can tell even without a clock that it’s about time he gets back to the Garrison. He hates that he has to bother Keith, but he has to be ready for work in the morning.

“Keith, I need to get ready,” he murmurs in Keith’s ear.

Keith’s eyes snap open immediately; Shiro feels his heartbeat quicken against his arm. “What?” he asks, alert and not at all groggy, searching Shiro’s face before he relaxes once more. “Oh. Hey.” His heart rate slows. “Yeah, uh. Here.” He carefully extracts himself from Shiro’s grip; Shiro misses his solid warmth already. He sits up on the bed, stretching langorously. 

He can’t help himself; Shiro reaches out to touch his hipbone, tracing a line of pale red-purple discoloration that streaks up towards his stomach. It’s faint and subtle, but in this late-stage daylight, it glows against the paler expanse of his skin.

Keith glances down in surprise. “Birthmark,” he explains.

“Hm.” Shiro runs his fingers along the length of it. “I like it.”

“You’re getting distracted.” Keith reaches over and combs back Shiro’s hair with his fingers, pushing his white fringe out of his eyes for him. “Go wash off, yeah?”

Shiro ends up washing his face with some regret, wiping the dried lavender streaks from his cheekbones and the splattered remnants of the paint explosion from his forehead and nose. Maybe Keith was right about it being his color.

When he wanders back into the bedroom, Keith’s not in there; all that’s left are the paint-stained sheets and the tousled remnants of their clothes. Keith must have opened a window, because the cream-colored curtains on the window flutter weakly in the meager desert breeze, bringing in the scent of dust and the petrichor of a distant lightning storm. Shiro wanders around, gathering up his clothes and redonning his uniform with as much grace as he can muster. That’s a bit hard to do when said uniform is wrinkled and splattered with purple paint, but Shiro likes to think he makes it work.

It’s also gratifying to remember that he still has Keith’s purple handprints on his chest, hidden beneath Garrison standards.

Shiro makes his way into the kitchen, following the scent of coffee, and finds Keith leaning against one of the countertops, sipping from a dark blue mug with a hand-painted symbol on it. He’s only in his underwear and an oversized tee, hair tousled and long against his neck. “Hey,” Shiro greets him with a smile.

“Made you some.” Keith nods to another chipped mug sitting on the counter. “Not sure how you take it.”

Shiro picks up the mug and peers into it. Keith must’ve put some cream into it. “Any sugar?”

“I don’t drink it with sugar, but there’s some behind you.” 

“Thanks.” Shiro stirs in a bit of sugar and inspects his mug. It’s got the same symbol emblazoned on it in thin, delicate brush strokes. He’s not sure if it’s a gang symbol or from a language he doesn’t quite know, but it fills his heart with a bit of foreboding. “These are nice mugs,” he says, raising his cup to his lips.

“Painted ‘em myself. Maybe I’ll bring one back for my mom when I see her again.” Keith falls silent for a moment, sipping his drink. “You can come back, you know,” he says. 

Shiro looks at him over the brim of the coffee mug. “What?”

Keith shrugs and stirs his own coffee with perhaps a little more force than is necessary. He mutters, “Y’know. For the painting. I usually don’t have multiple sittings because I usually get the gist of it done by the time the session is over, but-” Again, his shoulders make a valiant attempt to perform a casual gesture. It’s a good effort, but Keith’s discomfort is written on his face. “Well, we got held up.”

“Am I that distracting?” Shiro teases.

It has the desired effect: Keith’s lips turn up in a half grin. He looks at Shiro through the dark fringe of his hair, eyes gleaming with a hint of mischief. “You’re definitely more exciting than my other subjects.” He snorts and looks back down at his coffee mug, running his finger along its rim. “Younger, for sure.”

With a little upward quirk of an eyebrow, Shiro asks, “Close enough to you?” He’d never thought to ask. Keith looks like he’s seen enough to be in his twenties, at least.

Keith pauses, then nods. “Close enough,” he agrees.

Shiro nods and takes a sip of his coffee.

“You have paint, you know.” Keith raises his hand and rubs along the top of his own ear. Shiro is briefly distracted by the combined beauty of his slim fingers, dark hair, and the pale curve of his ear. Is it some divine rule that makes artists as beautiful as their creations?

He blinks out of it and asks, “What?”

“Paint,” Keith repeats, still tapping at his ear. 

Shiro reaches up and mirrors Keith, finding something dry and foreign smeared along his skin. He scratches absently at part of it and when he checks his fingernails, they’ve got flecks of lavender on them. He looks down at them, chuckling. “You really do like purple, don’t you?”

“I told you it suits you.” There’s a smugness weaving its way into the soft rasp of his tone. “I’m an expert in things like that.”

“Oh, I’m sure.” Shiro stalks across the kitchen towards Keith, setting his mug on the counter and plucking Keith’s out of his hands as well. He cages Keith in against the countertop, staring down at him. There’s paint beneath his right eyebrow, and Shiro runs his finger along it before tipping Keith’s chin up with his metal hand. Keith lets him do it, eyes already slipping shut and lips parting, because of course Keith knows exactly where this is going. Shiro obeys, dipping down to kiss Keith once more. 

Keith hums in approval, moving his lips in tandem with Shiro’s. Their noses bump against each other, still a bit clumsy with lack of familiarity, but they laugh it off softly; Shiro ducks his head to muffle his laughter into Keith’s hair, and Keith shrugs him off with a protest that their coffee’s going to get cold. Reluctantly, Shiro steps back and reclaims his mug, staying close to Keith but focusing on the warmth of the drink instead. It should be too hot for drinks like this, but this sort of domesticity is natural. 

Shiro stirs a bit more sugar into his coffee; the quiet clink of his spoon fills the companionable silence.

“So. The painting.”

“It’s going to look so boring now that I know what you really look like.” Keith makes a disgusted, dismissive noise. “Gray and yellow. They’re fine enough colors, but you stand out in others.”

“Purple?” Shiro teases.

Keith hops up on the countertop. “What can I say? I’m biased.”

“Biased,” Shiro repeats, stepping between Keith’s spread legs. Keith grins and wraps them around Shiro as soon as he’s close, holding him against the counter. Again, Shiro’s faced with the magnitude of his quiet strength. “Hey,” Shiro laughs, half-heartedly pulling away, “I have to go back to the Garrison.”

“I know.”

“I kind of don’t want to.”

With a smirk playing across his lips, Keith teases, “That doesn’t sound like the hero of the Galaxy Garrison to me. D’you really think I should be painting your picture?”

“Thought I was the perfect subject.”

“I regret telling you that.”

“Well.” Shiro shrugs. “Can’t take it back now.”

“No,” Keith agrees, looping his arms around Shiro’s neck. “Don’t think I want to, either. I was telling the truth, Shiro.”

“You’re a flatterer.”

“Just a good judge of character.”

Shiro leans in to kiss the smile off his lips.

And if the coffee ends up going cold, neither of them quite minds.

Eventually, Shiro insists that he really does have to leave, and they make their way back through the main room to the front door. Keith angles him away from the canvas as they go, forbidding him from looking at it. Shiro complains half-heartedly, but he obeys nonetheless. Before he goes, Keith catches him at the porch. He leans up into Shiro’s space, squints, and smiles. “Yep.” He nods, looking satisfied. “Brown. At least for now.”

Shiro ducks his head. “Do you like them better like that?”

Keith shakes his head. Shiro’s heart falls briefly, but then Keith says, “I like that they’re here, and that they’re on your face.”

“Eloquent,” Shiro snorts.

“I’m surprised you know that word.”

“Hey.” Shiro whacks him on the shoulder. “I was top of my class at the Garrison.”

Keith’s grin grows into more of a leer. “You were top of-”

“Keith.” Shiro slaps his hand over Keith’s mouth. “Not another word.”

The violet of Keith’s eyes gleams wickedly; it says just as much as his mouth does. “Get out of here,” he mumbles against Shiro’s palm. “Get back to your Garrison.”

Regretfully, Shiro steps back and heads down the creaky wooden stairs towards where he’s parked his bike.

“I like you, Commander Shirogane,” Keith calls after him. “You’re invited back to my house.”

Shiro puts on his helmet and slings his leg over the seat, looking back at Keith as he turns on the hoverbike. It hums to life beneath him. He grins and hopes Keith can see him. “I like you too, Just Keith. I can’t wait to come back.”

Keith salutes mockingly, and Shiro laughs.

He revs the engine one more time, just to see the way that Keith leans forward in eager curiosity, and speeds off into the desert.

 

* * *

 

Shiro gets back to the Garrison after nightfall, parking his bike in his designated spot. A few cadets are still out, edging close to curfew in their pursuit of some kind of fun; they all stop and give him quick salutes as he passes. Some of their eyes go wide as they take in the full extent of his purple-splattered uniform, but none of them say anything.

Shiro nods to them with a polite smile and goes on his way.

“Uh, Shirogane?”

Shiro stops in his tracks and turns. One of his colleagues, a flight instructor down in the sims division, is standing in the hallway, staring curiously at him. Shiro knows exactly where this is going. “Hi.”

The other officer raises his hand to pat at his own chest. “You know you have-”

Shiro holds up his hand. “I’m perfectly fine, thanks,” he says with as polite a smile as he can manage.

“Did something happen?”

“Just an accident.”

“But there’s not even any purple in your-”

Shiro stares. “It was a really bad accident,” he says, and he walks away before there’s any reply.

Privately, once he turns the corner, he allows himself to smile again.

He really does need a new uniform.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shiro gets to explore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> school is hard, guys. here's a chapter for your troubles. :)

Nobody can fight like Shiro.

High command seems to have realized this, because with his promotion comes an increase in hand-to-hand courses that he supervises. He gets everyone from the young cadets all the way through to the advanced courses for continuing officers of rank. They all seem to want to learn from the once-dead Kerberos miracle pilot.

Shiro understands, of course. If he were in their shoes, he’d surely want to try to pick the brain of an amnesiac commander by studying their fighting technique. Maybe some of these officers he trains are actually psychologists trying to figure him out, but nothing really comes of it except for the fact that Shiro can easily beat anyone in the Garrison. Nobody comes any closer to understanding why, least of all Shiro himself. He’s just  _ good,  _ plain and simple, and nobody can quite deny that.

The cadets give him a run for his money sometimes, but they’re really only a challenge if there’s more than one of them at once. Even then, he still hasn’t been beaten.

Not once.

He’d never had reflexes like this back before he’d left. Though he’d had the muscle stimulants, they didn’t substitute raw skill and instinct; there’s no way he could have done some of these moves beforehand. Surely, half of them aren’t even Garrison regulation; when Shiro holds a cadet’s arm behind her back, he has the urge to  _ twist,  _ to pull further until-

“I yield!” she cries, voice strained.

Shiro lets go of her like she’s on fire. That wasn’t an approved hold; he was way out of line. What was he thinking? “I am so, so sorry,” he apologizes before he can do anything else, staying on his knees on the sparring mat. “Are you okay?”

“I’m - yeah.” The cadet sits up, catching her breath.

Shiro leans back, wanting to give her space. He holds his hands out to her in a careful surrender before dropping them into his lap and waiting. “I didn’t mean to go that far, I just-”

“I’m fine, sir, not to worry.” The girl rises to her feet, stretching to fix any ache in the muscles Shiro leveraged his strength against. She’s got the build of a pilot, light and quick, and she stares down at Shiro with calculating eyes. Shiro likes her immediately; she’s resilient, and pilots need that.

Shiro stares around at the other cadets and says, “I think that’s enough for today, guys. Got a little carried away there.”

The girl - Rizavi, he thinks - holds her hand out to him. “I’m fine,” she insists. “I’m made of stronger stuff than that, Commander Shirogane.”

“That’s good.” Shiro smiles up at her.

“Do you…” She moves her hand a little bit. “D’you wanna get up, sir?”

Shiro furrows his brow. He’s fine on his knees, wrists still loosely crossed over each other in front of himself. Shouldn’t he be waiting here?

The vague concern on Rizavi’s face has him thinking otherwise, and he pulls a quick smile. “Oh! Yeah. Uh, lost my train of thought for a second there.” He reaches up, ignoring the faint alarm in the back of his mind that screams  _ wrong choice, too much disobedience  _ and takes the cadet’s hand. She helps him up, stepping back as he rises to his full height. Shiro squeezes her hand in a quiet thanks before turning to the others. 

“Are you sure we have to be done, sir?” someone asks from within the gaggle of awestruck cadets.

“I’m Shiro when we’re all just training,” Shiro reminds them. “And yes. You guys have had enough for the day.” So has he, of course, but he’s just inflicted more than his fair share of bruises on this particular group. “What I want you to take from this is that not all of your opponents are going to fight according to the rules. Some of them have no honor. They won’t care about how well you execute a hold.”

“So what do we do?”

Shiro smiles. “You take that control,  _ your  _ control, and you use it against them. If they have no form, they have no discipline, and they’re easy to unbalance. Never lose your focus.”

Rizavi leans forward, eyes wide. “Or what happens?”

Shiro shrugs and says, “One of the only two options. Victory or death.”

“Victory or death,” another cadet repeats - Kinkade, if he remembers correctly. 

“Yes.” Yeah, that sounds right. The words have an hard finality to them, tasting like iron on his tongue. The taste is more than a little familiar. Shiro glances down at his arms and frowns: the hairs there are standing on end. He looks back around at all of the cadets and says, “Dismissed, everyone. Good job today.”

With only minimal complaining, the cadets pick up their discarded items of clothing - Shiro lets them fight in full uniform or basic athletic wear according to their preferences - and start filing out of the training room. A few of them bunch together into smaller groups as they go, whispering to each other. One or two of them cast glances over their shoulders, meeting Shiro’s eyes before quickly looking away again.

Shiro’s had enough experience by now to realize that they’re talking about him.

He offers them a tight-lipped smile that doesn’t quite make its way towards being friendly, and he turns to begin his post-sparring stretches.

The room falls silent once the door clicks shut for the last time. The emptiness of it is vaguely unnerving. Shiro frowns down at his metallic wrist and flexes the fingers carefully, trying to find some sort of answer in the movement.

_ Disobedience?  _ Where did that even come from?

Shiro hates that his muscles remember Kerberos more than he does.

The door to the training room clicks open, creaks, and then closes again. It’s accompanied by heavy footsteps on their way over to where he is. Shiro can tell who it is by the deep, long-suffering sigh that accompanies the presence.

“Iverson. How are you doing?”

“How did the painting go?”

“Fine.” Shiro focuses on working out a cramp in one of his shoulder muscles. That cadet really dug their knee in there. “I have to go back; he didn’t finish it the way he wanted.”

Iverson makes a small noise of surprise. “That’s not like him. He’s efficient.”

Shiro shrugs and moves on to do some pushups. “He seemed distracted. I don’t mind going back.”

“You sure? It’s awfully out of the way, Shirogane.”

“I have free time.” Shiro savors the easy cadence of the pushups, glancing up at Iverson past the pale strands of his hair where it’s fallen over his face. “I promise, Iverson. It’s not a problem. You’re the one who wanted me to get this painting done anyway.”

“Command wants it,” Iverson corrects him. “I just agreed.”

Shiro tries to blow his hair out of his face. It’s surprisingly ineffective, so he resigns himself to being blind. “So I’m doing it. No problem.” He flashes a smile up at Iverson, or at least the vague shape of him. “Apparently it’s looking good. Keith won’t show me.” He doesn’t mention that he has Keith’s communicator code now too, and that he’s already gone back once. 

Iverson grunts, “Painters.”

“Painters,” Shiro agrees sagely.

It pretty much sums it up.

 

* * *

 

When he returns for the third time, Keith’s not inside.

Shiro finds him around the back of the house, doing pushups in the sand, heedless of the consequences on his poor hands. Or maybe he’s not: Shiro notices black fingerless gloves on his hands, and they surely don’t completely protect Keith’s hands, but Shiro appreciates that they’re there at all. Proper safety is always good.

“Looking good,” he calls, heading towards him. “Didn’t know you had a routine.”

“What, are you the only one allowed to exercise?” Keith stretches and stands, tossing his hair out of his eyes, and Shiro’s pretty sure he’s not going to survive knowing him. He’s even more alluring the third time around, probably because Shiro’s already picked out some favorite features and now he knows where to look.

Shiro shrugs. “Guess not.” In hindsight, it’s obvious that Keith works out; he’s got the body of an athlete and the energy of a soldier. He must keep that condition somehow. There are a few sun-bleached dummies out here in the back yard too; they’re hacked beyond repair, scarcely showing any of their original forms. Shiro nods to them with his chin. “Where’d you get all these?”

Keith shrugs, and the movement makes more of his muscles catch the sun, highlighting the sheen of sweat there. He’s been working for a while, or perhaps the sun really is just that hot. Or both, maybe. He glances over the dummies and says, “Picked them up secondhand. Makes good practice. Keeps my reflexes sharp.”

“For the coyotes.”

“Maybe.” Keith saunters over to him. “In lieu of sparring, I take what I can get.”

“We can spar.”

Keith shakes his head, smiling slyly up at Shiro. “You’d wipe the floor with me.”

“I’d go easy on you,” Shiro protests.

“Oh, I bet.” Keith trails bare fingers along Shiro’s shoulder. “Looks like you got a new uniform.” He rises up on his toes expectantly, and Shiro obliges, giving him a chaste kiss hello. It’s easy like this, like they’ve been doing this sort of thing for ages, and Shiro almost wishes that they have. “That was quick.”

“Still needs to be tailored, but yeah.” Shiro smiles, running his fingers through Keith’s hair and ignoring how it’s sweat-drenched. “Besides, I have extras, y’know. We have more than one uniform.”

Keith bats his hand away and heads towards the house, gesturing for Shiro to follow him. “I’m a mess, Shiro. Come wash your hands or something while I clean off.”

“Keith.”

“If you want to get my head sweat into the inner workings of that hand, it’s your funeral,” Keith snaps over his shoulder, but he smooths over the edges of his tone with a more inviting smile. “Don’t come crying to me if you start smelling like a gym.”

“Bet you’d like it.”

Keith barks out a laugh, kicking his back door open and making for the bathroom. Shiro follows him in, snagging a towel from the little shelf where he noticed Keith keeps them. He closes the bathroom door and leans against it, watching Keith. Keith starts peeling off his gloves, tossing them onto the edge of the sink with impressive accuracy. “Bet differently. I like you when you smell like you. Not like my old desert sweat.” He strips down quickly - he wasn’t wearing much to begin with - and runs the shower water. Steam fills the air soon enough, fogging up the mirror next to Shiro. “Although,” he muses, turning to face Shiro, bare-skinned and unashamed, “you’d probably smell good if you stayed in my bed for a little while longer.”

Shiro doesn’t hide the way his gaze travels down the tanned length of Keith’s body, moving past scars and birthmarks to the flat plane of his stomach and further down. “Yeah,” he agrees absently. “Yeah, I bet.”

“You’re not even listening.” There’s something like a pout in Keith’s words, but Shiro detects something just beneath it: mischief, maybe. Cunning. He wouldn’t put it past him. Keith turns to test the water temperature with his fingers, and Shiro takes advantage of the new view.

There are still faintly black and blue marks on his hips where Shiro’s fingers dug in just a bit too hard. Shiro’s surprised that the bruises are still so clear, but maybe Keith’s blushing skin just does that; it’s another one of his mysteries that Shiro’s desperate to learn the truth of. He wants to figure out the story of Keith’s skin by mapping every inch with his mouth, bit by bit, seeing where his teeth leave marks and where Keith’s sensitive to the touch.

Keith looks over his shoulder, eyes half-lidded, and smirks.

Shiro breathes in sharply, stricken by the feral beauty of him.

He’s like art in motion.

Keith laughs softly, barely louder than a breath, and steps into the shower. He knows exactly the effect that he has on Shiro, reading him easily after just three times seeing each other. For once, Shiro’s not mad that he’s so transparent.

The water soaks into Keith’s hair, pressing it down against his head and back in a lustrous, shining dark sheet. It loses some of its unruly waves like this, but Keith gains a new beauty, bare and gleaming under the stream of water. His dark eyes meet Shiro’s as he raises his hands up to run through his own hair, slipping shut after a moment as he loses himself in the moment.

“I could join you,” Shiro suggests when he finds his voice again. He hates that it sounds so much like begging.

“But you look so good in your uniform,” Keith says, opening his eyes once more. They’re dark, supernova violet, and Shiro hates him for being so beautiful. “I’d hate for it to get wrinkled before I get the chance to paint you.”

“Do you have an iron?” It’s his last, desperate attempt to win this round.

Keith grins. “Nope.”

Shiro groans aloud and leans back against the bathroom door.

“Hey, you can still watch. I’m right here.” Keith keeps the curtain to the shower drawn aside, giving Shiro a view of  _ everything.  _

“You’ll get water all over the floor,” Shiro says, mouth dry despite all the steam.

Keith shrugs. “It’ll dry. We’re in the desert.” He returns his attention to his hair, lathering shampoo into it carefully. He massages it into his scalp, humming out something tuneless and soft and amused.

Shiro desperately wants to be the one doing that for Keith.

Somehow, Keith manages to make this an effortless performance. He ignores Shiro in favor of washing himself thoroughly, getting rid of the sweat and dirt and paint that’s collected on his skin. Shiro, in turn, tries to ignore the growing tightness in his pants, but he’s never really been lucky when it comes to controlling himself around Keith.

When Keith steps out of the shower, dripping water onto the cracked tile floor, he’s more smug than he has any right to be, and Shiro’s about two seconds from dragging him to bed.

Keith pushes past him for the door, but he stops when he looks down at what’s clutched tightly in Shiro’s hands. “Oh! You got me a towel.” He stretches up on his toe tips once more, pressing a soft kiss to the corner of Shiro’s mouth. It’s tender in the middle of this game he’s orchestrating, and Shiro thinks he might be asking for permission to keep going, to push this past the limits. He’d probably give in if Shiro really wanted him to, and that’s another thing Shiro likes about him: he respects when Shiro’s had enough. This is a bold move for their third encounter. It’s a challenge.

Shiro doesn’t back down.

“Of course I did,” he murmurs instead, pressing the soft, care-worn towel against Keith’s bare chest. He doesn’t turn his head to capture Keith’s lips in the bruising kiss he so desperately wants to leave there. He’s not about to lose this game. “Can’t be tracking water around the house. You might get it on the painting.”

“Oh,” Keith breathes against his lips, close enough that the fresh-washed scent of him is the only thing Shiro can focus on. Maybe it’s the only thing he’s ever known. “Can’t have that.” He reaches up, trailing a thoughtful, damp finger along the line of Shiro’s jaw. His smile curves against Shiro’s cheek when Shiro shudders in response to the touch. Keith orders, “Go collect yourself. I’m getting dressed.”

In a daze, Shiro does as he’s told, wandering out of the bathroom and away from its too-warm steam and too-hot Keith. He stands in the middle of the hallway, forgetting his purpose in favor of watching Keith get dressed in his room just down the hall. 

When Keith emerges in soft pants and a softer shirt, he’s smiling in just the way Shiro has come to recognize: tentatively, like he’s not quite used to it, but like he wants to keep doing it. “That was refreshing,” he says, toweling his hair dry. A few too-damp strands cling to his neck, trailing drops of cooling water down towards his collarbone. Shiro thinks he could probably get away with leaning in and licking some of the drops from his skin. It would be so easy to just lean in.

Fingers snap in his face.

Shiro blinks, and Keith’s staring at him with a single brow quirked up in amusement. “What?” he asks.

“I said to get into position.” Keith points to the living room, where the chair lives. “Be the good subject I know you are.”

Shiro opens his mouth to protest, but he catches the promise of a reward in Keith’s eyes, and he abruptly nods and obeys.

Keith’s good at playing games like this.

Shiro spends the next two hours in borderline agony, looking Keith in the eye as Keith calmly paints him with no hint of his trademark impatience. It’s Keith making conversation this time, smoothly asking questions that are the exact brand of soft small talk that Shiro usually loves. Now that he knows them for the ploy that they are, he thinks he might hate them. 

But not Keith. God, he doesn’t think he’d ever hate Keith for this. This is one of his best ideas yet. Don’t hate the player, hate the game, and all that, right?

He’ll win this one.

Keith laughs when he finally lets Shiro press him into the sheets later. “I had a feeling you’d be like that,” he purrs into Shiro’s ear, tugging at it gently with his teeth. “Wanted to test your limits.”

“Can I test yours?” Shiro asks, catching Keith’s wrists between the fingers of his metal hand and keeping them pressed against the mattress over Keith’s head. Keith’s slender, clever fingers reach out for him to no avail, grasping at nothingness. “Keith.”

Straining against Shiro’s hold with a strength that still amazes him, Keith says, “I’d like to see you try.”

Shiro loves a good challenge, and by  _ god,  _ it’s going to take him a while to figure Keith out.

He can’t wait.

 

* * *

 

The fourth time he visits, it’s not even for the painting.

Keith sends him a message that he doesn’t open until he gets back from checking the hallways to make sure the cadets are in their beds. It’s short and lacking any flowery language, saying instead,  **_u can come over if ur not busy_ **

Shiro stares at the message, already loosening the collar of his uniform. He’s got the morning off tomorrow; he could probably stay the night at Keith’s place and ride back for his afternoon conference call. One-handed, unbuttoning his jacket with the other, he types out a quick  **_Sure. I’m about to leave now._ **

He sends it out, changing out of the day’s uniform, and keeps the messaging window open. There’s not an immediate response, and Shiro’s worried that he was too late coming home and the offer might not be extended anymore, so he tries not to look at it. He heads into the bathroom, tousling his hair out of its usual perfect style for the day, and brushes his teeth to distract himself. 

It doesn’t really help.

At least his teeth end up clean.

Shiro’s not really known for his impulse control or his patience; he makes his way back into the bedroom after long and checks again. His heart does a dumb little leap in his chest when he realizes there’s a message from Keith waiting for him.

**_doors open for u come in when u get here_ **

Well.

Good thing he got into his civvies instead of his pajamas. Perks of being an optimist, and all.

Shiro makes his way out of his quarters, out of his uniform, and winks at the cadet he catches trying to sneak through the hallways. He’s headed in the direction of the roof, which is only slightly more incriminating than going to the showers. The cadet gapes at him, practically frozen in fear. Shiro snorts and keeps walking.

“You’re not gonna write me up, sir?” the cadet asks.

“I’m off duty,” Shiro explains. “I won’t tell.”

What can he say? He’s in a good mood.

Whistling tunelessly, he heads down to the officers’ garage, hops on his bike, and speeds off across the swirling, still-hot sands. The way there is easy to remember by now, and he doesn’t bother turning on his navigator. Instead, he chases the landmarks in the distance, veering around cliffs and taking the jumps he’s not been able to try out since before he left for the Kerberos mission. He laughs as he does it, reveling in the freedom of finally, finally having a place to go out here. The desert is lawless and open and everything that the Garrison’s not, and Shiro’s always wanted to have a place to escape to.

Keith’s house, he realizes as he parks his bike at the front porch, is becoming that place now.

Just as expected, the door is unlocked for him. Shiro bounds up the creaky stairs, avoiding the spot on the railing that never fails to give him splinters, and makes his way into the house. “Keith?” he calls, yanking his boots off and setting them down at the door. “Keith?”

“Kitchen.”

Shiro frowns. He doesn’t sound happy.

That’s fine. Shiro can be happy enough for the both of them.

He carefully arranges his boots by the door and takes off his jacket, slinging it over the top of Keith’s unused easel as he makes his way over to the kitchen. And there’s Keith, practically radiating a storm, stabbing his spoon into his coffee as if that’ll grant it some extra, forbidden form of flavor. 

“Missed me?” Shiro asks him teasingly, testing the waters of Keith’s mood. “My next painting appointment’s not till the day after tomorrow.”

Keith glares at him, aggressively stirring the coffee. “It’s almost been a week. I was thinking about you.”

“Hey, hey, hey, why the bad mood?” Shiro reaches across the counter and plucks the spoon from Keith’s hand, setting it aside. “You’re gonna break the mug if you keep that up.”

“I can make a new one.”

“You do pottery too?” Shiro asks, bemused.

Keith rolls his eyes. “No, Shiro.” He lifts the mug, baring the half-scratched price sticker on the bottom. “I just paint them.” He puts it back down on the counter with excessive force, sending a ceramic chip skittering towards the floor. Keith’s eyes follow it disinterestedly. “Fuck. Oh well.”

“What’s eating you, Keith?” Keith’s prickly, sure, but today he’s borderline hostile. The fact that he called Shiro over is proof enough that he probably needs someone to talk to.

“Okay, in hindsight, it’s nothing. I shouldn’t have bothered you-”

“Keith. Hey.” Shiro stares at him until Keith meets his gaze. “You wanted me over here. I’m here. I can go again if you want, but I’ve been told I’m a good listener.”

The corners of Keith’s lips tip upwards. “By who?”

“Everyone.”

“Everyone,” Keith snorts, and he dumps his half cup of coffee down the sink, running his finger against the rough edge where he’s chipped the bottom of the cup. While he does it, he says, so close to a mutter that Shiro almost misses it, “My mom called.”

“You don’t seem really happy about it, so...bad news?” He doesn’t know much about Keith’s family other than that he’s traveled with his mom for years before settling down in the desert.

“Nah, she was yelling at me.”

Shiro leans forward, tracing the pale rings on the counter left behind by what must have been countless cups of coffee. “Did you do something wrong?”

“Kind of, I guess. It’s a family business kind of thing.”

“Really?” Shiro tilts his head to the side, fascinated. “I didn’t know you did other work.”

“Painting’s good for supporting me while I work on my main task, but….” Keith shrugs. “It’s so long term that it just fades into the background.” He scowls. “Until now.”

Shiro asks, “Did you forget to do something?”

“No. More like…” Keith waves his fingers absently in the air, painting his thoughts into the space between them. “Like, my mom thinks I’m losing focus. Getting distracted. Possibly ruining everything. Y’know, the usual.”

“Well.” Shiro furrows his brow. “Well, are you?”

Keith stares at him, eyes inscrutably violet. “I might be,” he admits softly.

Shiro holds his gaze; he doesn’t think he can look away. “You don’t sound like you care.”

“I don’t.” It’s soft from his lips. “It’s a good distraction.”

Shiro swallows. He licks his lips.

There’s a moment when Shiro thinks he might say more, but Keith shakes his head, and the moment is broken. “It’s nothing, really.”

“Done talking?” Shiro asks quietly.

“About this, at least.” Keith offers him a tight-lipped smile, and despite the concern creasing his face, there’s still something warm in his eyes. “I didn’t have dinner yet. You staying?”

“If you’ll have me.”

“You came all the way out here; I’d better make it worth your while.”

Shiro grins. “You really know how to take care of a guy.”

They don’t fall into bed this time, or at least not for the reason Shiro expected when he came here. This time, Shiro strips down to his underwear, and so does Keith, and they lie down together in fresh-washed sheets that smell faintly of citrus. They don’t really talk about anything else, and they trade a few lazy kisses, but they each seem to realize how exhausted they are, and they drift off to sleep beneath the sheets, fingers just barely touching in a tentative attempt at intimacy.

For the first time in a while, Shiro sleeps without vague half-nightmares; in fact, he doesn’t dream at all.

 

* * *

 

The next visit is the most productive one they ever have, and that’s only because Keith insists. Shiro sits patiently while Keith captures his likeness on the canvas, and they have a bit of idle chat while they do it. Keith seems satisfied by the end of the session, and he tells Shiro the painting looks good.

He still doesn’t finish it, though. The gala’s not for ages, and if he has time to perfect the painting, he’ll take it. 

“Besides,” he pants into Shiro’s ear as Shiro holds him up against the wall and takes him the way he’s been thinking about since they met, “this means I get to spend more time with you.”

Shiro can’t argue with that.

 

* * *

 

Shiro finds the painting on the seventh visit.

It’s not the one of him; Keith won’t let him look at that one, citing bad luck. Shiro insists that’s only a thing for weddings, but Keith stands firm, and Shiro’s portrait in progress remains hidden.

No, this painting is stowed away behind some of the others. Maybe it’s on purpose, but Shiro isn’t even thinking about that when he goes poking around through Keith’s stash of old covered-up canvases. There are stacks of rejected versions of portraits Shiro recognizes from the walls of the Garrison. The elite of his order stare out at him, half-finished and abandoned. The last painting, stored away behind the others, has a dark cloth over it that’s not like the rest. Shiro rolls the soft fabric between his fingers. The texture is foreign, but he decides he likes it.

Keith’s given him the run of the place, right?

Carefully, he lifts the dark cloth up and over the top of the painting, baring it to the light. He leans closer, picking out the features, and-

_ Oh. _

It’s Keith.

Or...almost.

He’d recognize the hair anywhere, and the delicate, carven lines of his jaw and cheekbones. That subtle strength is hard to find in anyone else this side of the desert or beyond. It’s Keith.

But it’s different.

“What’s this one?” he hears himself call.

Keith, from the bathroom, calls, “Which one? There’s a lot of them, Shiro.”

“It’s you,” Shiro replies, and even his own voice seems far away. This painting...there’s something about it. “Keith, it’s you, but your eyes…” And his teeth, and his skin, and the tips of his ears. The whole thing is suffused with a dark violet light, catching the tones in Keith’s irises. Shiro had always thought that purple and yellow were the ugly opposites of each other, but now he sees the truth of it in the eyes of this not-quite-Keith: perfectly opposed, bringing out the dark and the light in their counterparts. Were it not for the cool endlessness of his irises, the gold of his scleras would not shine nearly as bright.

Something in his heart recoils from it, and another reaches out.

He’s missing something here. There’s a part of the puzzle he’s missing, and it’s hiding in the dark spot in his head where the Kerberos mission lives.

Something about this painting is very, very wrong.

“Hey.”

Shiro nearly jumps again. Keith has a talent for sneaking up on him. Here he is, beside Shiro’s shoulder, still shirtless and tousled and soft. There’s something harder in his eyes, though, when his gaze ticks to the painting and then back at Shiro. Shiro says, “I just...found this.” It’s only kind of a lie.

Beside him, Keith’s frown reaches his mouth, tugging it downward in concern or anger - Shiro’s not sure. “Right.”

“It’s beautiful,” Shiro says, because it is. Feral, yes, and totally alien from the faces he’s so used to seeing Keith create, but it’s gorgeous in its own right. Maybe because it’s Keith, or at least a parody of him.

Keith tenses beside him. “Think so?” he asks.

Shiro nods. “I know so.”

Keith shrugs, still staring at the painting. He doesn’t say anything else.

“Artistic license?” Shiro asks. He doesn’t actually believe it himself, if he’s being honest. Something about this seems like more than just imagination.

Maybe it’s the way that there’s a very unique expression painted into the inhuman eyes: panic, loathing, and something unimaginably fierce. Something wild, passionate, and desperate.

You can’t just make that up.

Right?

Keith frowns at the painting, then reaches out and pulls the fabric cover back over it, hiding it from the light. “Yeah, something like that,” he mutters. “It’s nothing. Just a concept piece. Another world.”

“Another world,” Shiro echoes. Then, nervously, he says, “Sorry that I went snooping.”

Keith fixes him with a long, searching look. “It’s fine,” he says. “It’s just that some stuff is hard to explain.”

Shiro nudges him. “I wouldn’t presume to understand the mind of an artist.”

“Guess not.” Keith leans up against him, and Shiro wraps an arm around him on instinct, seeking solace in the solid lines of his body. “Let’s go to bed.” He kisses Shiro’s shoulder, right over a scar that always makes Shiro shiver. “I’ve been thinking about you for ages.”

Shiro lets Keith guide him down onto the sheets, and he watches with rapt attention while Keith takes everything he wants and more. He’d give Keith anything, he decides.

He puts the painting out of his head, and the uneasy feeling disappears with it, replaced only by  _ Keith, Keith, Keith- _

He likes it that way.

 

* * *

 

One time, Keith answers the door wearing nothing but his underwear and Shiro’s shirt.

The first part is welcome. The second is unexpected, but Shiro decides right then and there that it’s at the top of his list.

Keith must realize what’s going on by the way that Shiro is gaping at him from the doorway, and he looks down at himself. “Hey, you, uh. You left this here last time.”

Shiro’s undershirt is big on Keith, pale against his tanned skin and darker birthmarks. Keith’s not exactly swimming in the shirt, but he certainly doesn’t fill it out the way Shiro does. This one’s already a bit worn out and oversized as it is, and one of Keith’s shoulders peeks out from the off-kilter opening where the head and neck belong, further proving that he’s not really meant to be wearing this shirt. 

Or maybe he is. Maybe this is the universe’s grand plan to repay Shiro for a year of lost memory.

“Oh! I must’ve forgotten it.” He smiles, looking Keith up and down. “Sorry about that.”

“I don’t mind. I like it.”

“Keep it, then.” 

Where did that come from, and why was the idea not filtered through his rational mind on its way to his mouth?

It feels awfully intimate to do. Shiro’s pretty sure he’s seen things like this in old movies - boy meets boy, they fall in love, and the boy gives his jacket to the other boy to remember him by when they’re apart. It’s saccharine as all hell.

But god, he can’t get enough of the way Keith looks in his shirt.

Keith looks down at himself, tugging at the hem of the shirt. “You sure?”

“Yeah, uh.” Shiro nods with purpose. “Yeah, for sure.”

That’s what people do when they’re dating, right?

Are they dating? Is that what this is? Is it a date if one of them is here because it’s his job?

Keith knocks him out of his reverie by gently pushing Shiro’s fringe out of his face. “Hey, you,” he teases. “You in there?”

“Are we dating?” Shiro blurts.

_ Oh my god. _

“What?” Keith steps back a bit, and a little smile plays across his lips. “Shiro.”

“Uh.” His face is burning. “Are we?”

_ Takashi Shirogane, you absolute- _

“Yeah.”

Shiro blinks. “Yeah?” he repeats.

Keith tilts his head to the side. “Do you want to be?” he asks. “I figured that’s why you asked.”

“Uh. Yeah. Yeah, I do.” He’s not quite sure why he can’t form words. It’s one of Keith’s many side effects, apparently.

“Then we’re dating.” He says it like it’s the simplest thing, like he’s telling Shiro about the weather or ordering him to keep his chin in just the right position.

Shiro stammers his way through a soft “Keith-”

“One condition,” Keith says, holding up a finger to stop him. “I keep the shirt.”

“Done,” Shiro says immediately. That’s the best condition he’s ever agreed to.

Keith’s answering smile could rival the sun itself.

 

* * *

 

“What’re you smiling about, Shirogane?” Iverson growls as the two of them watch a set of cadets fail miserably at the Kerberos Rescue simulation.

Shiro shrugs. He hasn’t even realized he was doing it. “Just, uh. Got some good news the other day.”

Iverson grumbles an unintelligible response and marks down a criticism on a cadet’s evaluation form.

Shiro, when he’s sure he’s not being watched, lets himself smile again.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “What’re you drawing?” Shiro asks quietly, glancing away from the clear sky to study how Keith looks bathed in moonlight, bowed over his chest as if in prayer.
> 
> Keith’s silent for a moment, tracing a straight line from a circular scar to the tip of one of the great long ones along Shiro’s ribs. “Just connecting the dots,” he replies. “Constellations.”

Sometimes, they ask each other questions.

They’re dumb ones most of the time, just building up their little caches of information on each other. Shiro learns that Keith’s never seen the Grand Canyon even though he claims to have traveled all over the place. Keith’s surprised to hear about how Shiro accidentally lost his first tooth by jumping off his apartment’s second floor balcony in an attempt to fly. Shiro insists that it’s true and shows Keith the little scars on his lip and arm that are proof of the fall. Keith admits that his mom usually cuts his hair for him, and that he’s always wanted to look like her. Shiro tells the story of his own attempts to cut his hair, and of the time he’d tried hair clippers for the first time and had done some truly atrocious things that required hats for weeks.

“Are there pictures?” Keith asks. “I need to see them.”

“You’re not getting any more blackmail material on me,” Shiro laughs, taking a sip of his drink. Today, it’s some smooth alcohol instead of water, burning pleasantly on its way down his throat. It’s not nearly enough to get him intoxicated - that’s hard to do nowadays anyway - but it’s enough to leave him calmer, at ease in the armchair. He doesn’t even mind that he’s still wearing his uniform, because at least he’s here with Keith. “I’ll take that secret to my grave.”

Keith snorts. “Yeah, okay, Commander. Very threatening. I believe you.”

“I’ve died one time already,” Shiro warns. “Check the obituaries. I’m famous, y’know. So if I’ve hidden those pictures up until one death, you shouldn’t doubt that I’ll do it again.”

“I never doubted you.”

Shiro raises his hand to swipe through his hair on instinct, but a piercing glare from Keith stops him short. He lowers the hand back down, cowed for now, and asks, “Never?”

“You’ve never given me a reason.”

“Good to know you won’t be responsible for soiling my good name,” Shiro says. “But you’re still not going to see the photos of that haircut.”

“You’re not nice to me,” Keith pouts. “You give me those photos, or I’ll find a way to soil that name of yours anyway.”

“If anyone’s capable, it’s you.” Isn’t that what the whole point of political cartoons is? To satirize and destroy? Keith’s a good enough artist to take him apart without ever putting a pencil to paper. “My good name’s yours. I surrender.”

Keith flashes him a wicked grin. “That reminds me, actually.”

“Hm?”

“Why no first names?” Keith asks. “You asked me to call you Shiro when we met. That’s just your last name, but...not.”

Shiro hums for a moment, considering it. He explains, “Shiro’s always been my nickname. People really only say my first name when they’re addressing me formally or...really personally.”

The meaning’s clear enough to anyone smart enough to listen. If anyone will understand, it’s Keith and his knowing, piercing violet eyes. Shiro trusts him with the implicit weight of his name.

“When was the last time someone called you by your first name?”

He knows exactly when. He can still remember the last time he heard it, and how his name had sounded in Adam’s voice. Disappointed. He clears his throat. “Before, uh. Before Kerberos,” he manages.

Keith makes a quiet noise of acknowledgement, not looking away from the canvas. “So a while, then.”

“A while,” Shiro echoes.

He lets Keith get back to his work; they don’t often talk during the process itself. Besides, just getting the chance to watch Keith focus on his work. That’s one of his favorite things: Keith doesn’t do things halfway. Once he’s in motion, he’s a nigh-unstoppable force in everything he does. 

Wordlessly, Keith gestures to the side with the end of his brush. Shiro tilts his head accordingly, lifting his chin a bit. He raises his eyebrows, and Keith nods before returning to his work. This time, there’s a bit of a smile on his lips. That sort of expression doesn’t come around easily where Keith’s concerned. Shiro basks in the warmth of his approval; he made Keith smile like that. 

After a while - or at least he thinks it’s a while, judging by the shadows on the wall and how they’ve stretched towards the kitchen - he ventures, “Keith.”

“Hm?”

“Why don’t you use a last name?” Come to think of it, he doesn’t think he’s ever even heard or read it. It’s always been Keith. Just Keith. Shiro remembers the scowl on Keith’s face when he’d asked during their first meeting.

“Good question.”

And that’s all he says.

Shiro waits the requisite minute that it might take for Keith to elaborate before asking, “Is that off limits?”

“Just not a particularly interesting answer.” Keith keeps his eyes on the canvas. His brows bunch together in something that might be focus. “I grew up with my mom, and she didn’t really have one.”

“Just your mom?” 

“She had help.” Keith’s expression smooths into a smile. “Takes a town.”

“Village,” Shiro corrects.

Keith sighs and adds some more paint to his palette. “Idioms are hard.”

“Guess your mom didn’t use them often, huh?”

“Nah, not really. She doesn’t really do figures of speech.” Keith spreads his paint around aimlessly. Or maybe there is a method to it. Shiro doesn’t claim to understand the intricacies of artists’ methods, least of all Keith’s. “I miss her,” he admits.

Shiro nods sympathetically. “When was the last time you saw her?”

“Before I came here.”

“It’s been a while, then.”

“It has,” Keith agrees, and there’s a tightness in his voice now. 

“Do you have time to visit her?”

Keith shakes his head. “It’s just not in the cards.” He stops, and his jaw works for a moment. “Shiro, I don’t really like talking about it. Can we-”

Shiro nods. “Yeah, of course.” He adds that to the second of his Keith lists; this one tracks all of the topics that they’re mutually avoiding. Kerberos is the first one, and the one Shiro is happiest to put there. There are never any difficult questions about his forgotten past here, and that’s refreshing. Shiro watches Keith relax visibly, and he asks, “Thinking about something?”

“Your name.”

“You’ve said it before when you’ve said my full name,” Shiro points out.

“Takashi,” Keith tries, and Shiro can’t help but shiver. The rough edges of Keith’s voice fit well around the syllables of his name. Maybe it is different when it’s said on its own. Keith smiles to himself and returns to the canvas, focusing on his rendition of Shiro’s face. “I like it,” he says after a bit. “It suits you.”

“It’s my name.”

Keith peeks his head around the canvas to glare at Shiro. “Kill the moment a little more, why don’t you?” 

Shiro grins and leans over to meet his eyes. “It’s just the truth, Keith.”

A balled-up wrapper comes sailing his way and hits him squarely in the forehead. “You moved,” Keith scolds. “Get back in position.”

Thoroughly chagrined, Shiro shifts back upright in the chair. He pulls a face once he knows Keith’s looking, though, crossing his eyes. “Better?” he asks.

With the long-suffering sigh of a man at his wits’ end, Keith says, “At this rate, I’m never going to finish.”

Shiro snorts, “I’ll be the judge of that.”

Keith makes the most disgusted noise that Shiro has ever heard. It’s somewhere between a groan and a laugh, and Shiro kind of loves it. A lot. “God, I hate you. Lowest hanging fruit, Shiro. I thought Garrison officers were better than that.”

“I’m a disappointment, unfortunately.”

“Aw, never that, Commander.” Keith beckons with one finger. “C’mere.”

“Really?”

“If you’re gonna fidget, we’re not getting anything done.” Keith stands and wipes his hands on his pants, stepping away from the easel. “Come on.” 

Shiro rises with a smile of triumph. He’s reaching his arms out before he even reaches Keith, pulling him in close against his chest. Keith lets himself be held, tucking his face into the crook of Shiro’s shoulder and kissing all of the skin he finds there. When he makes his way up to Shiro’s lips, Shiro welcomes him without hesitation. He reaches up and tangles his metal fingers in dark hair, relishing the soft sound that he gets in return.

They both know where this is headed, and when Keith reaches down to palm at Shiro through his uniform pants, Shiro makes a point of canting his hips up into the touch. He’s not hard quite yet, but under Keith’s capable hands, he’s sure to be soon. “Hey,” he murmurs. “It’s been a bit.”

He’s not sure when two days became too long to stay apart, but they are now. He misses Keith when he’s back with the Garrison. The bed in his quarters is too small and too empty and too quiet. He’s used to the little creaks and squeaks of the springs on Keith’s ancient mattress and bedframe, and to the warmth of another body beside him.

“Any suggestions?” Keith murmurs against his lips. “Your choice of venue.”

“I’m free all night,” Shiro tells him. “Let’s go outside.”

Keith laughs softly, and Shiro kisses the smile off of him, tasting Keith’s drink on his lips. It’s sharp and bitter, but underneath it is always the taste of Keith. 

“Outside,” Keith breathes, and he starts his work on the buttons of Shiro’s uniform.

As it turns out, nothing quite matches the feeling of kissing Keith beneath the open sky.

Nothing compares to the sound of distant crickets singing their songs in a rhythm to match Shiro’s hips, and to the way their sweat beads and cools on their skin, only to be warmed again by the heat between them. 

When Keith moans out Shiro’s name, it echoes against the steep walls of distant plateaus, coming back fainter but still intoxicating. It rolls back to them with perfect rhythm as Keith says it again, over and over until all Shiro knows is Keith and all of his impossible echoes. This desert is theirs for as far as the eye can see. 

Afterwards, Shiro lies on his back, staring up at the stars. Keith retrieves some paint from inside - silver this time - and straddles Shiro’s waist, using his fingers to connect the myriad scars he finds there. He whispers words under his breath that Shiro can’t quite catch, but they have a wonderful music to them.

“What’re you drawing?” Shiro asks quietly, glancing away from the clear sky to study how Keith looks bathed in moonlight, bowed over his chest as if in prayer.

Keith’s silent for a moment, tracing a straight line from a circular scar to the tip of one of the great long ones along Shiro’s ribs. “Just connecting the dots,” he replies. “Constellations.”

It’s a wonderfully topical thing to do. In the cool air of the nighttime desert, Shiro lets Keith draw straight lines across his scarred skin and tries not to move for fear for destroying all of his careful work. He makes a game of it, trying to close his eyes and visualize the shape of whatever Keith’s working on. He knows most of the major constellations by heart thanks to the astronomy book he loved to death when he was a kid. But none of Keith’s drawings follow the old familiar patterns. 

“What’s that one?” Shiro asks as Keith sets to work along his arm. His muscles twitch a bit beneath the cold paint, or maybe he’s always this keyed-up when Keith is around.

“Balmera,” Keith answers, though the word is muffled into Shiro’s skin as he presses his lips to it.

“Not sure I know that one.”

“No,” Keith agrees, turning his head to look at him with wide eyes gone silver in the moonlight. His hair hangs down to brush Shiro’s skin, catching paint along the ends. “No, I don’t think you do.”

It’s too much. Shiro can’t just let him sit there looking like that and not worship him for it.

“C’mere,” he murmurs, catching Keith’s chin and bringing their faces close enough for him to kiss. Keith’s lips taste faintly of salt from how they’d been sweating together earlier, slotting together against his like the perfect fit. This thing between them - this harmony, this relationship - it holds them together.

Forgotten, the tube of silver paint falls to the ground.

Shiro’s hands run down the lean expanse of Keith’s back, mapping out familiar muscles on his way. Here’s one scar, and there’s the long one beside his spine, and there’s the little series of scratches at his hipbone. That one jumps beneath the coolness of his metal touch, and Shiro soothes the surprise away with another kiss. Keith accepts the apology with lips and tongue and warmth, and Shiro knows he’s been forgiven.

Keith’s still stretched from earlier, and he keens quietly when Shiro guides himself back in. He rolls his hips down with Shiro’s name on his lips, then turns them over, dragging Shiro’s heavy bulk down over himself.

It’s softer this time, and less desperate. Keith’s the one on his back, trading breathless kisses with Shiro and letting himself be claimed. Shiro treats him with every bit of care he deserves, sliding his metal and human hands along Keith’s body to memorize every bit of him.

As he comes, Keith breathes out something like a curse, but the word makes no sense to Shiro. It must be another language, but it’s not one he’s ever heard, and Shiro latches on to the beauty of it as he works Keith through the aftershocks of his orgasm, chasing his own still. 

Keith reaches up, shaking, and traces Shiro’s face with a silver-stained finger. He whispers another word, low and musical and foreign, and Shiro comes with a cry of Keith’s name.

Afterwards, when he showers, Shiro regrets losing the starmap that Keith found on him. For a bit, the scars had been beautiful.

“Balmera,” he says into the stream of water. It has a nice ring to it.

Maybe he’ll ask Keith to teach him those constellations one day.

 

* * *

 

“Can I see the painting?” Shiro asks another day, kissing a freckle he’s discovered on Keith’s shoulder.

Keith glances over his shoulder with a soft grin. “No.”

“How many times do I have to ask?”

“As many times as it takes for you to realize I’ll never show you.”

Shiro pouts and moves his lips to one of the large, pale purplish birthmarks on Keith’s shoulder. “Never?”

Keith sighs, “Well. The finished product.”

“But not earlier?”

“Not a second earlier.” And Keith reaches back and runs his fingers through the fringe of Shiro’s hair, tugging contemplatively while Shiro devotes his full attention to the birthmark. “And I’ll know if you look.”

Barely moving his lips from Keith’s skin, Shiro mumbles, “Oh, I’m sure.”

“I will.”

“And what’ll you do if I look?”

Keith hums, audibly considering it. The low music of it hitches a bit when Shiro bites down gently on the corded muscle of his shoulder, but he recovers admirably. “Withhold sex, maybe. You seem to like that, so maybe losing it will teach you a lesson.”

“Seem to,” Shiro mocks softly, moving his lips to Keith’s neck instead. “I think I like anything with you, Keith.”

“Then maybe I should -  _ Shiro  _ \- stop doing anything with you.”

Shiro doesn’t move his lips from Keith’s neck, enjoying the warm smell of him while he can. He does let one of his hands rove downwards, though, sliding it down the hard planes of Keith’s stomach to wrap gently around him. Keith makes a soft, satisfied noise, rolling his hips forward in lazy interest, and Shiro smiles. “Gotta make the most of the time we have then, huh?” 

Keith groans, “Got that right,” and lets his head fall back to rest on Shiro’s shoulder.  _ “Shiro, fuck,  _ keep doing that.”

Shiro does. 

It goes very well.

“How will you know if I look?” Shiro asks later. They’re lying side by side now, staring up at the ceiling of Keith’s bedroom. Shiro’s got his metal fingers twined with Keith’s; the feeling isn’t quite the same as skin on skin, but Shiro enjoys it all the same.

“What?” Keith glances over at him. “At the painting?”

Shiro nods.

Keith laughs a little bit and kicks at the sheets, sending them sailing upwards before, slowly, gravity drags them through the air and back towards their tangled feet. “You get this look on your face when you see my paintings.” He pauses, and the smile on his face shrinks, but something’s added to it as well: something fond, or at least close enough to it that Shiro’s heart does a curious little leap in his chest. “I dunno. You get all quiet. And you smile. It gets a little dopey sometimes.” He huffs out a breath that might be a laugh. “It’s cute.”

“You have a way with words,” Shiro murmurs, and he turns his head to kiss Keith’s arm.

Keith snorts and shrugs him off. “Better with a brush.”

“I can think of a few other things you’re good with.”

“Don’t get any ideas.”

“Keith.” 

“And you say I’m insatiable.”

“Because you are.” Stretching a bit, Shiro readjusts so he can kiss Keith on the cheek this time, peppering a line of affection from his nose to his jaw and back again. “Can’t blame me for enjoying it.”

With a little hum of acknowledgement, Keith says, “Well, you’ve got me there.”

He kicks the sheets again, and he laughs, letting the air catch them over and over, creating a veritable storm of cotton. 

Shiro watches, and then he looks at Keith’s face, and at the unadulterated joy on his face. It softens the worried lines around his eyes and mouth that are there far too early for any painter. Like this, when he’s happy, he’s radiant.

He keeps looking, and he wishes he could paint too, if only to capture this moment.

 

* * *

 

It becomes....not so much about the painting.

It’s been three and a half months. It feels like it’s been too long, and not nearly long enough.

Shiro wakes up in Keith’s bed almost as often as he wakes up in his own. It’s allowed, of course: he’s an officer, and they can’t exactly tell him no when he’s already gone to the solar system’s frontier and back for them. So he leaves the Garrison when he’s not needed and sticks around at Keith’s. Since he’s not flying, that means he stays with Keith more often than not.

Keith shows him his bike, telling him firmly to stand on the porch while he ducks into the garage to retrieve the hoverbike. He closes the door behind himself when he does it, and Shiro doesn’t mind. Everyone has their secrets.

As it turns out, Keith drives as well as he paints and laughs and fucks. 

The two of them race through ancient canyons created by rivers that have long since gone dry, kicking up dust in their wake. Sometimes Keith wins. Sometimes Shiro does. Every time, they end up laughing, and more than a few times, Keith pins Shiro against his bike and sinks to his knees, smiling up at him like a predator, and Shiro wouldn’t trade it for the world.

“One day,” Shiro says, “I’ll teach you how to drive right off this cliff.”

Keith snorts, “Who’s to say I don’t already know how?” But he takes Shiro’s hand anyway, linking their fingers together, and the two of them sit on the edge of an impossible cliffside, staring at the shadowed valley far, far below.

And it’s nice.

Keith has other paintings he’s working on.

There are only so many Garrison officers to paint, and even though they pay well, Keith’s got to make ends meet when he’s not at their beck and call. Some people want old-fashioned paintings of their pets, a surprisingly popular option, so sometimes Keith takes his bike and rides into town to meet with the owners. Other times Shiro comes into the house to find Keith sitting on the floor surrounded by pictures sent in by a pet owner, trying valiantly to compose a painting from the various angles of his client’s beloved cat. The best times, though, are the ones when Keith’s clients bring their pets out into the desert for a painting in person.

Shiro’s not even sure why it’s an option. Keith’s always grumpy in the hours leading up to the appointment, and he certainly paints a bit more quickly if only to get the pet owner out of his house as soon as possible. He gets along with the dogs quite well, but cats are hit or miss, and any birds or rodents immediately start trying to escape from the house. It’s a disaster for the most part, and Keith complains every time. Shiro tells him he should just stop letting people come to his house, but Keith insists that the ones that come over usually pay extra, and Shiro can’t argue with that.

There’s some entertainment value in it, though.

It’s always worth it to see the way their eyes widen when they catch a glimpse of none other than Commander Takashi Shirogane, hero of the Galaxy Garrison, leaning over a random painter’s kitchen counter in nothing but his underwear and an oversized tee. Shiro usually flashes a smile as he stirs some sugar into his coffee, raises his mug in a little cheers motion, and heads back to Keith’s room to read through some reports for the next day’s meeting, leaving the poor soul to ruminate on the truth of what they’ve seen.

Because, well. Nobody’s going to believe them, will they?

Keith affectionately calls him a monster for waging psychological warfare with his clients, but Shiro insists he’s just having a cup of coffee at his boyfriend’s house. He’s doing nothing wrong, after all. Can’t a man enjoy his coffee?

So the visits continue, and Shiro savors the look on people’s faces of complete disbelief. Small victories, and all that.

They have a good time. It’s easy to sit around with Keith and just experience the world. There’s no need for deep conversations or discussions of theory. While Shiro’s always enjoyed those, he just needs a place to decompress and escape, and Keith’s become that place for him. 

At one point, late one evening when they’ve each had maybe a few too many drinks, Keith points a savage, accusing finger at a drawing that’s been nailed to the wall and drawls, “I hate that one. Remind me never to use fuckin’ oil pastels again.”

“What are oil pastels?” Shiro asks, blinking about ten times at the drawing to attempt to bring it into focus. Or maybe it was just drawn like that on purpose?

Keith snorts and takes another sloppy sip of his drink. “Pretentious crayons,” he mutters past the rim.

Shiro nods safely and raises his glass. “Fuck oil pastels,” he agrees.

The night goes kind of fuzzy after that.

In the morning, Shiro wakes up first. He resists the urge to kiss Keith awake, choosing instead to let him sleep. The temptation is incredible, though. Like this, on his back with a hand extended out to where Shiro was lying, lips slightly parted, he’s a perfect picture in the morning light. Shiro’s not sure how he got lucky enough to find him. He takes another moment to admire Keith before searching for his sweatpants and pulling them on and making his way out of the bedroom and into the kitchen to get ready for the day.

He sets up a pot of coffee and makes some eggs and bacon, frying them up until the whole house smells like breakfast. Shiro closes his eyes and inhales, cherishing the comforting smells. This is nothing like the Garrison’s cafeteria, or like shuttle meals. They’ve come pretty far in terms of food quality out beyond atmo, but nothing comes close to beating an actual home-cooked meal. 

Just as he’s finishing up and plating their breakfast, Keith wanders into the kitchen. He’s only wearing a pair of underwear - Shiro thinks it might be his - and is barefoot, wiping sleep from his eyes. The morning light spills through the kitchen window and lights up his birthmarks, highlighting the blushy purple red of them perfectly. Shiro takes a moment to admire them before heading over to greet him.

“Good morning,” he says, guiding Keith to the counter with a hand on the small of his back. Keith blinks wearily at him from behind his bangs, and Shiro ducks down to give him a quick kiss before urging him into a chair.

“How are you in such a good mood?” Keith demands, hunching over the counter. 

Shiro shrugs. “I’m a morning person.”

“Those don’t exist.”

“Maybe not where you’re from,” Shiro argues gently. He grabs the coffee pot and pours a cup for Keith, sliding it his way.

Keith snorts, “Where I’m from, people are awake all the time. I don’t think they sleep.” He slips his eyes shut as he takes a tentative sip of the hot coffee, and something like a smile threatens to curl its way across his lips.

“Maybe they sleep when you do.” Shiro places Keith’s breakfast in front of him and waits.

“Yeah, likely story.” Still with eyes half-lidded and unfocused with sleep, Keith picks up his fork and goes to poke at his eggs. He blinks.

Then blinks again.

Shiro waits.

“I can’t believe you,” Keith says flatly.

Widening his eyes in the picture of perfect innocence, Shiro asks, “What’s wrong, Keith?”

“I hope you’re proud of yourself.” Keith spins his plate to face Shiro. “I know you made them like this on purpose.” And there, sitting on Keith’s plate, are two eggs and some strips of bacon arranged in the rough shape of a smiling face.

In Shiro’s opinion, they’re quite charming.

“Do you like them?” Shiro asks, trying and failing to control the twitching of his lips. All this training for years, and he still can’t keep a straight face.  _ You’re a sham, Shirogane. _ “I’m an artist just like you.”

“You’re banned from my house.”

Shiro holds his hands up in surrender. “Seems a little hasty. I’m paying you for your time, you know.”

“The Garrison’s paying me, Shiro.”

“I’m in the Garrison!”

“You’re going to be in your grave after I’m done with you, Shirogane.” Keith picks up a piece of bacon and slaps Shiro on the hand with it, leaving a spot of grease where it hits. “Let this be a lesson to you.”

Shiro snorts and steals Keith’s napkin, wiping his hand clean. “You’re such a child.”

“Deal with it. This is my house.”

Shiro admits defeat and digs into his own bacon, biting off a piece with a smile. Keith glares at him a moment longer before his facade cracks and he grins, beginning to devour his meal with surprising speed. He’s always ravenous in the morning, and he’s got a bigger appetite than even Shiro, which is absurd. Shiro watches him, forgetting his own coffee and breakfast in favor of admiring the sunlit angles and glow of Keith in the morning.

Keith must feel his gaze, because he looks up, peering at Shiro through the waterfall of his dark hair. “What?” he demands.

“Nothing,” Shiro replies, and he smiles. “Nothing at all.”

 

* * *

 

The gala’s coming up in a week. The painting of Shiro has long since been sent to the Garrison for preparation and approval, and Keith has no more obligations to Shiro other than the ones he chooses. Shiro’s not his responsibility anymore. He can tell him to leave whenever he wants.

He doesn’t.

So Shiro stays.

The questions have leveled off into easy conversation. Sometimes they still murmur quiet inquiries late at night when they’re drifting off to sleep, but for the most part they know enough for now. Shiro likes the quiet agreement. Keith has his secrets, and Shiro has his own. Neither of them are quite ready to talk about them, and that’s okay. 

“What do you know about the Kerberos mission?” he asks one night, staring up at the cracks in Keith’s ceiling. 

Keith is silent for a long, long time. Shiro almost thinks he’s asleep, but he recognizes the tension coiled in Keith’s body beside him. When he hazards a glance over at him, Keith is staring at the ceiling too, brow furrowed. In a time as calm and silent as this, Keith doesn’t deserve to look that sad; Shiro regrets bringing it up. Maybe Keith knew the Holts. Maybe he resents Shiro for not being able to remember anything of value to report to Earth. Shiro wouldn’t blame him if he did.

“I know enough,” Keith says, and he doesn’t elaborate.

It’s a non-answer, and they both know it, but Shiro’s not going to pry. If he did, Keith might want to know something in return, and Shiro doesn’t have anything to offer but vague half-remembered impulses and the suggestion of fear. He’s not eager to stir that up right now.

So he slings an arm around Keith’s shoulders. It’s the prosthetic one, the one that the Garrison techs call a feat of engineering that they’re afraid to even touch for fear of destroying the technology. Shiro’s loved and loathed it for months, but Keith has only ever accepted it. He does now too, shifting to rest his head at the crook of Shiro’s shoulder like he was born to fit there, and maybe he was, because it only feels right to have him at his side. Shiro keeps the arm slung loosely around Keith’s neck, and one of Keith’s hands reaches up to catch his black and silver fingers, bringing them to his lips for a kiss. The sensation is that weird half-dulled variety that the prosthetic sends to his head for processing, but Shiro shivers all the same.

It’s Keith, after all.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It goes wrong.

Shiro hates parties.

Okay. Not  _ parties,  _ maybe, but events like this. 

He used to stand off to the side with Matt during these things. All the parties would pass in much the same way, with the boy genius and the hotshot pilot talking in the corner but still putting on their best smiles when people decided they wanted to talk. Most of the time, he was able to get away with it. It’s harder when he doesn’t have a friend to use as a crutch, and especially when he is the one for whom the party’s being thrown. 

Shiro looks down at his drink, clutched carefully in his metal hand, and sighs.

He misses those days.

It’s been a year since Shiro’s survival was announced to the public, and the Garrison is finally throwing a party to celebrate Shiro’s promotion. There’d been some backlash from certain circles who’d believed that Shiro’s miraculous return to Earth without his crewmates was grounds for imprisonment rather than praise. The Garrison had pushed back firmly with a title for Shiro and now his painting, cementing his role in the ranks for good. Most of the guests here are in support of the promotion, but a few of them glare at Shiro so hard that it feels as if they burn holes into the back of his head. 

That’s fine. He can work with that.

Pleasing people is a challenge all its own, and an entirely different monster than flying a ship or working past his old disease. It’s a challenge only half under his control, and that makes it all the harder.

But Shiro likes a challenge, and he’s trying his best.

He’s gotten a lot better at the meet-and-greet format of these functions. Most of the people who want to talk to him are quite interesting anyway, and Shiro’s happy to talk to them. It’s just that it gets exhausting to make all the same small talk with twenty different people over the course of the night, and to fend off questions that veer too far into insensitive territory. As it turns out, avoiding the mystery of the Kerberos mission is a highly delicate art.

Tonight more than ever, it’s an elaborate dance. People have gotten creative with the way they pry for information. They try to work their way around being overt, instead inquiring about how he’s handling being back on Earth or whether he’ll ever share the piloting secrets that saved his life. In turn, Shiro’s gotten creative with the way he deflects the questions. It’s not like he’s hiding anything from them, anyway. He knows just as much as they do. The only thing he’s hiding is the mess of scars beneath his suit, but they don’t need to see that.

For now, though, they’ve left him alone, and Shiro’s retreated to the little dais where his painting waits, covered for now. It’s difficult for most people to make the trek up the extra step to him, held back by military decorum and respect, and Shiro’s absolutely taken advantage of that. He’s not being  _ unfriendly,  _ really. Just...slightly less accessible.

He dares to sip the drink. It’s a nice sweet one, a guilty pleasure on nights like these. It won’t get him anywhere near tipsy, so at least he won’t make a fool of himself, but it’s a nice thing to hold in his hands and anchor him in place. At least he can work out his restless, nervous fidgeting on something he can grasp and control.

There are too many people here for him to recognize. A lot of them are Garrison high command from bases all across the world, here to celebrate their success story. Others are members of the press, and still others are politicians and celebrities and scientists. Somehow, they all have a claim on Shiro and his legacy.

He’s pretty sure the Holts were invited too, but Shiro hasn’t seen Colleen or Katie since before the Kerberos mission. He doesn’t blame them for not wanting to show up, but. Well.

It’d be nice to see a familiar face.

“Hey, Commander.”

Oh, he knows that voice.

Shiro starts smiling before he’s even completely turned around, knowing who’ll meet him. He doesn’t get to finish the expression, because his jaw drops instead.

_ Keith. _

God, he’s a vision.

In a well-cut suit of all black, he cuts a lethal figure, slim and strong and imposing. The dark, dark red of his tie stands out against everything else, only serving to make his eyes gleam more. 

Shiro didn’t even know that Keith owned a suit. The thought of him wearing anything but his casual clothes is borderline unthinkable. Now Shiro’s pretty sure that it’s going to be the only thing he thinks about him wearing for the rest of time. 

When he manages to stop gaping at him and remembers how words work, he stammers, “You look…” He stops. He’s not sure he can describe it in a way that Keith will understand. Instead, he settles for a smile, reaching out carefully to tuck Keith’s dark hair out of his ear. He hopes Keith will get the message. “Good.”

Keith slips his eyes shut when Shiro runs his hand through his hair, and the familiar, peculiar rumble of his contentment vibrates through Shiro’s fingers. Shiro wants to fall into this moment and stay here forever.

But they’re on a raised platform where pretty much everyone can see them, and maybe this isn’t exactly the time. Something like this is just a little too intimate to be on the right side of acceptable PDA.

Keith looks like he’s about to pout when Shiro removes his fingers from his hair. But he looks around at the rest of the ballroom and says, “Hell of a party.”

“Thought you hated coming here.” Keith seems to dislike the rank and file of the Garrison, or at least their methods. He doesn’t talk about it too much with Shiro, probably because Shiro’s been a faithful member since his youth. Shiro appreciates his tact.

Keith shrugs. “I still do. But,” he says, and he loops his arms around Shiro’s neck, “I happen to know a guy here. Some hotshot pilot rising up in the ranks. Think he’ll give me the time of day?”

Pretending to consider it for a moment, Shiro furrows his brow. “Y’know, he’s getting a portrait unveiled tonight. He’s probably got an ego the size of Kerberos right about now. You probably wouldn’t like him.” He leans in close, kissing Keith on the nose when he’s sure nobody’s looking. Keith recoils, wrinkling his nose, but he’s got enough of a smile on his face for Shiro to know that he really doesn’t mind. “But I can maybe see if he’s willing to talk to you.”

With a grin, Keith says, “Be my wingman.”

“Ah, but what if I want to sweep you off your feet instead?” Shiro asks.

“That can be arranged.”

They laugh about it together, snickering before the covered painting, and Shiro thinks that this could maybe be the new normal. It’s not like with Matt, but it’s still nice. 

Admiral Sanda approaches and greets Keith, who handles himself well and treats her with the proper degree of respect. He’s painted her before, after all, and he’s polite. Sanda lets them know that they’re going to be unveiling the painting, and that she’d love if Keith could give a short speech so everyone could thank him accordingly. Though he goes pale, Keith agrees.

The crowd is called to attention, and Sanda greets them all, thanking them for coming out to celebrate the miraculous return of Commander Takashi Shirogane, and to commemorate the new painting in his honor.

Keith says a few halting, nervous words about it being an honor to serve the Garrison, and how Shiro was a good subject. Something about respect, and sacrifice, and bravery. It’s sincere, from what Shiro can tell, but Keith very clearly wants to stop speaking as soon as possible.

Admiral Sanda puts him out of his misery swiftly, taking back the microphone and saying a few words of praise. Her real speech will come later, Shiro knows.

And then they sweep the cloth from the painting, and everyone in the room collectively gasps, and so does Shiro.

So that’s what he looks like to Keith.

It’s in the same style as so many of the other portraits. Keith paints with startling realism, catching the minute expressions in Shiro’s face, and he’s done it exceptionally well this time. It’s clear that he took advantage of having Shiro around for multiple sittings, refining everything he could. It’s, plain and simple, Shiro, sitting straight up in the well-loved brown armchair and staring out at the world with solemn, challenging eyes. In his Garrison uniform and with his hair carefully arranged, he looks like a proper officer.

Shiro’s seen plenty of pictures of himself, but something about the painting is so much more intimate. It’s him in Keith’s eyes.

“It’s perfect,” he breathes into Keith’s ear, and he squeezes his hand.

Keith looks up at him and smiles, and it’s like the stars themselves are in his gaze.

When the crowds have parted, Keith brings Shiro back up on the dais so they can get close to the painting. At this short of a distance, the detail is astounding. Shiro takes a moment to admire every bit of it.

“Here.” Keith takes Shiro’s right hand and carefully folds all the fingers down but one, heedless of the foreign power of the prosthetic, and points the index finger up towards the ear on the painting. “Left a little something for you.” His fingers caress Shiro’s wrist just a bit longer before he releases him. “Take a look for yourself.”

A gift? Shiro’s doubtful at first, but he squints at where Keith’s directed his attention, and it truly does take him a moment to see what he’s talking about. It’s not bold enough that anyone else will notice it, but Shiro does. He steps closer to the painting when nobody’s looking, leaning in to study the finer details. And - yes. There it is. 

Keith put a dab of purple paint in the shell of Shiro’s ear.

It’s barely large enough to be visible on a painting of this size, but now that Shiro’s noticed it, he can’t see anything else. Against the warm golden tan of his skin, the brown of the armchair, and the muted gray and yellow of his uniform, the purple is a cool relief. If Shiro focuses hard enough, he’s able to understand why Keith thinks it brings out his eyes. They look more silver when he looks at them with the lavender in mind.

He blushes.

So Keith thinks about that day a lot too.

Though it’s been months since that first session, Shiro raises his hand absently to that ear, rubbing along it in search of some trace of the paint that had once been there. He misses it now that he’s aware that it’s gone.

When did Keith do it?

“As soon as you left,” Keith murmurs in his ear, seemingly figuring out what he’s thinking. He’s good like that. “Couldn’t get it out of my head.”

“You’re playing with fire,” Shiro tells him, still looking at the painting, though he gets chills at the sound of Keith’s voice. “Besmirching the portrait of Commander Shirogane with unsanctioned colors? Unheard of.”

“Okay, yeah, but I made the portrait. So.” Keith turns towards him, leaning up into his space. “Artistic license, and all that.”

Shiro chances a look down at him, and he has to desperately rein in his impulse to kiss him right here where everyone’s watching. It’s not exactly becoming of an officer. 

He hopes Keith knows that he really, really wants to, though.

Keith raises an eyebrow. “Something on your mind?”

“Do I really look that serious?”

Maybe serious isn’t the word he’s looking for. 

Does he really look so sad?

Keith leans over a bit, knocking their shoulders together. “It’s the expression you made. Very official. You look good, Shiro.”

“But-”

“But you still look like you know how to smile.” Keith steps forward and points to the corners of Shiro’s eyes, rendered in delicate brush strokes on the canvas. He doesn’t quite touch the surface of the canvas, letting his fingers hover just above his masterpiece, but it’s clear that he knows his work well. “See this? That’s the mark of someone who’s happy.” He looks over his shoulder at Shiro. “Or could be.”

Maybe it’s the fondness in his eyes that convinces Shiro.

He nods, and he lets a little bit of a smile creep across his face. The delight in Keith’s eyes is reward enough. “You’re too nice,” Shiro tells him, leading him away from the painting and back down to the level with the rest of the patrons. The crowd fills in behind them as more people try to get close enough to admire Keith’s work. Shiro’s proud - people are appreciating Keith’s work.

Also his face. But nobody else needs to know that he’s feeling validated by that.

“I need a drink. Be right back.” Before Shiro can stop him, Keith tugs him down to kiss him on the cheek, leaving Shiro warm, and slips off into the crowd. Shiro loses sight of him almost immediately; Keith’s good at disappearing. He raises his hand to his cheek where Keith kissed him, smiling at the remnant that Keith left behind for him.

Hm. He should’ve asked Keith to get a refill of his own drink. He’s been nursing it for too long. Maybe one of the wandering waiters can help him out. He flags one down and, instead of asking for a new drink, just sets down his old one and trades it for one of the little hor d’oeuvres on the tray. It’s quite good. Some sort of crab, maybe? Shiro munches on it carefully, trying not to get any crumbs on his dress uniform.

It mostly works.

He wipes his hands and mouth with the little cocktail napkin, trying to erase any trace of food. The Garrison’s newest commander needs to present himself with every possible bit of decorum.

And not a moment too soon.

“A moment?”

Shiro knows that voice too.

It takes a second for him to steel himself, but he manages to turn and meet this new visitor’s eyes.

“Adam,” he says. “Hi.”

“Ta-” Adam stops, visibly collects himself, and says, “Shiro.”

“I’m glad you could make it,” Shiro tells him.

“Of course. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.” Adam gestures around at the party around them. “All of this for you. You deserve this.”

For what? For surviving? For returning? For agreeing to be the Garrison’s poster boy?

Instead of asking, Shiro just settles for saying, “Thanks.”

“You’re looking good,” Adam says. Then, softly, “Healthy.”

Shiro nods. “Thanks, Adam.” He pauses, and the two of them stare at each other for a few moments. Around them, the music blares, but it fades into the background. It’s just the two of them for the moment, face to face at the celebration of Shiro’s survival.

It’s hard to talk to him now.

Adam had come to visit him when Shiro was still in recovery. Through the thick synthetic glass of Shiro’s Garrison-imposed prison, they’d quietly agreed that Shiro’s return to Earth didn’t imply a return to normal for them. 

It’s for the best, really. Shiro’s not sure he’d be able to go back to normal after the things he’d seen, whatever they were.

So it’s fine. Adam still teaches and flies, and they’re colleagues.

Maybe they’ll get back to friendship one day; Shiro misses the easiness of his companionship. But for now, there’s a year and millions of miles between them that Shiro put there when he climbed into the shuttle with the Holts. It might take a while to bridge that gap. 

Shiro nods to the painting, desperate to get back on track. “My - Keith, uh. He painted this.”

As if on cue, Keith rematerializes at his side with a small glass of amber alcohol clutched in one hand. He looks from Shiro to Adam and then back again before saying, “I hope I’m not interrupting you guys.”

Well, that’s...surprisingly polite, for Keith. Shiro’s distantly impressed that he’s not making snide comments yet; he’s only got Shiro’s side of the story to build an opinion about, anyway. Shiro remembers his manners in time to gesture between the two of them and say, “Adam. This is Keith.”

Keith raises a hand in a nervous little hello. “Nice to meet you, Adam.”

Adam reaches out his hand. “A pleasure.”

A surprised smile curls at the edges of Keith’s lips, and he takes Adam’s hand firmly. 

When they withdraw, Adam says, “Shiro’s mentioned that you’re the one who painted this.” He gestures to the painting. “It’s wonderful. You got all of his finest features, and then some.”

Keith’s lips tip upwards. “Thanks. Really. It means a lot, ‘specially from someone who knows Shiro well.”

Adam nods; his gaze lingers for a moment more on the painting before he meets Keith’s eyes once again. “I mean it,” he says. “Truly.” He looks at Shiro, nods once, and says, “I’ll talk to you again later, Shiro.”

“It was great to see you, Adam,” Shiro replies, and he means it. The two of them are luckier than most - at least they can still be in the same room as each other after their separation. Even after everything, they respect each other.

“You as well, Shiro.” A pause. “And you too, Keith.”

Keith nods. “Was nice to meet you, Adam.”

With that, Adam takes his leave, mingling with the crowd once more, and Shiro feels like he can breathe again.

“That went well,” Keith says, watching Adam’s retreating form.

“Of course it did. It’s Adam.” Shiro shrugs. “He’d never do anything to embarrass you or me, especially here. He’s a good guy, Keith.”

Keith’s gaze focuses on him now. “You miss him?” he asks.

“A bit, yeah. Sometimes a lot, sometimes not at all.” Shiro looks away from Adam; it’s not healthy to dwell too much on a painful past. “We had a good run. That’s all.” With a smile, he places his hand on Keith’s shoulder, reaching up to card his fingers through the hair that brushes down there - the most intimate he can get in a place like this. “Besides, he changed. So did I. And now I have you.” He lets out a little laugh. “Y’know, Keith, we would’ve never met if not for Kerberos, probably.”

The violet smile in Keith’s eyes fades a bit. “Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, you’re right.” He stares at the floor for a moment, furrowing his brow.

Shiro squeezes his shoulder gently. “Keith? You with me?’

Keith looks back up at him, eyes wide and earnest. “I - yeah. Shiro, maybe we should talk-”

“Ladies and gentlemen of the Galaxy Garrison and the press!”

Keith snaps his mouth shut, and his gaze snaps to the main podium, where Admiral Sanda is standing before the microphone once more. Something tenses and bunches in his jaw, and Shiro longs to reach out and soothe the worry away, but this isn’t the time or place.

The admiral makes a longer speech, this time centered around Shiro, and about the legacy of the Kerberos mission, and the meaning of true sacrifice.

Shiro knows what’s coming. His heart pounds in his chest. God, he should be used to making speeches by now, but still his nerves come back to haunt him.

“Commander, if you’d like to say a few words…?”

Okay.

Shiro puts on his polite, controlled Commander Shirogane face and squeezes Keith’s hand to reassure himself before he straightens his uniform jacket and makes his way up to the podium. He stares out at the crowds of people below him, all in their dress uniforms or formal best, and says, “Thank you, Admiral.

“I’m honored to be here with you all. I know that this has certainly been an eventful year, and that there is much we’ve learned since I returned from the Kerberos mission. More than ever, I wish the Holts could be here to share this day with me. I miss them with all my heart. Matt and Sam were - well, they were good friends.” His heart aches, even now, in front of all of these people. He swallows his grief and looks around at everyone gathered to see their miracle pilot. He’ll give them honesty if that’s what they want. “I often feel like I should have been the one still missing. Matt and Sam had so much ahead of them - so much they still wanted to do.” And Shiro had only a few years left in his prime.

Or he did, before he came back with no memories and a new arm and no disease.

He tries not to think about that.

“All the same, I’m happy to be back home on Earth. And I’m happy to have a new chance at life, and serving the Galaxy Garrison to the best of my ability. And,” and here he pauses, taking a breath, “I’m excited to experience new things. New places. New people.” He smiles. “To new beginnings.”

“To new beginnings,” the crowd echoes, but Shiro has eyes only for Keith.

The smile on his face is all he needs.

After the crowd’s done clapping for him, Shiro makes his way down from the podium and back to Keith. He wraps a hand around his waist, reeling him in close, and says, “I really do hate speeches.”

“You did great,” Keith assures him.

“Hey, what were you going to say before the admiral started her speech? Something about needing to talk?”

Keith smiles and shakes his head. “It wasn’t urgent. Don’t worry about it.”

“If you’re sure,” Shiro says dubiously. “You seemed kinda upset about it earlier.”

“It’s nothing,” Keith promises. “We can talk about it later. No rush.”

Shiro frowns. “If you’re sure.”

“Come home with me tonight,” Keith murmurs. He stares up at Shiro with his wide, starlit purple eyes. “Don’t stay here.”

“Sure,” Shiro agrees. He wants Keith close. “Yeah, of course.”

They duck out of the party at the first opportunity they get, and Shiro says all of the requisite goodbyes and nothing more. It feels good to ditch his own party, and he and Keith laugh about it on the way down to fetch their bikes.

The desert air is cool on their faces as they race side by side along the moonlit sands, heading back to their little sanctuary out in the middle of nowhere. Shiro dares to glance across the way to Keith as they speed alongside each other on a fragile cliffside, and he nearly gasps at the realization.

Keith’s beautiful.

He’s impossible.

Shiro thinks he might-

He swallows and revs the engine, tearing his gaze away in favor of making sure he doesn’t crash, and lets Keith lead them home.

They park their bikes out front, side by side. Keith doesn’t bother to bring his into the garage like usual, instead leaping off of it and into Shiro’s personal space, leaning up to stare at him. 

Shiro can’t believe his luck.

“I, uh-” He stops. Stares.

Clears his throat.

Keith tilts his head up, eyes wide, and asks, “Shiro?”

God, in the starlight, his eyes are unreal. Shiro wants to wrap him up in his arms and never let go.

He tries again. “I-”

No.

It’s not the time.

Shiro leans in instead, kissing Keith as softly as he can manage, and pulls away just enough to murmur, “Nothing.”

Keith hums and leans up to close the distance once more, looping his arms around Shiro’s neck to reel him in. He kisses Shiro with purpose, and Shiro opens his mouth to let him in, giving control over to him for now. This is what he’s been craving: Keith in his arms, close and warm and present, not asking for anything more than what Shiro offers to him.

It’s never been like this before. Not with anyone else.

Shiro’s tempted to tell him - really, he is - but that’s for another time. The right time.

For now, he’s content with this.

They fall into bed together, shedding their tight suit and dress uniform along the way, left only in undershirts and underwear. There’s no need to go any further, and Shiro’s too tired to even consider it. He’s just happy to have Keith, and to have that whole ordeal be done.

In the dark, Shiro lets his fingers explore all of the parts of Keith he’s long since memorized. Here’s the strong, toned line of his thigh, and there’s the toned curve of his rear, and the angular planes of his chest and shoulders. Here are the scars, and here are the smooth starlit stripes along his hips and shoulders, perfectly symmetrical birthmarks to contrast the random remnants of forgotten violence.

Keith hums beneath his touch, content to be the one to soothe Shiro to sleep. “Takashi,” he whispers fondly into the night air, and Shiro shivers.

Eventually, Shiro gives up trying to understand every moonlit impossibility of Keith’s body, and he tugs him in close, burying his nose in his hair to kiss his head.

“I’m happy for you,” Keith mumbles sleepily into his chest, nosing his way into his favorite position. “You deserve to be happy.”

“I am happy,” Shiro promises. 

“And now you’ve got your own picture and everything. The Garrison’s golden boy.”

“Purple boy,” Shiro corrects, just to feel the way Keith smiles against his skin.

“That’s right.” Keith nuzzles closer. “You’re their champion now.”

_ Their- _

“What was that?” Shiro asks. His heart does a curious, desperate stacatto against his ribcage.

Absently, on the tail end of a breath, Keith murmurs, “Champion.”

He falls silent, heedless of the hammering of Shiro’s heart, and soon enough his breaths even out into the calm rhythm of a deep sleep.

Shiro holds him close, staring wide-eyed at the ceiling. Keith’s final word echoes around in his head, bouncing around, anchorless, in search of something he feels like he should be recalling. At the forbidden, dark back corner of his mind, the word finds purchase. It sticks.

It tugs.

_ Champion. _

His blood rushes in his ears, deafeningly loud in this silence. It sounds formless and impossible, and Shiro tries to find answers in it.

Maybe it’s a crowd cheering.

Maybe it’s someone screaming.

He inhales sharply, and the air smells like iron. 

To the ceiling, and to Keith’s sleeping form, Shiro says, “Oh.”

 

* * *

 

His nerves wake him up before the nightmares can.

For that, he’s almost thankful. He’s pretty sure that any dreams now are going to be far worse than the dark, malformed monstrous ideas that’ve lurked in his mind since his return. Images, half-remembered and horrible, drift to the surface of his awareness.

He can’t stop thinking about it. 

_ Champion. _

It’s an innocent enough word, but Shiro’s not heard it in ages. That’s a word reserved for athletes and winners and competition. It has no place in the Garrison.

But Keith said it.

Something doesn’t feel right anymore. Something’s been kicked loose in his head, and he chases the thread of it through the darkness of subconscious thought. 

And there, at the wall in the back of his mind where the Kerberos mission lived, something’s crumbling.

Shiro stares up at the ceiling of Keith’s room, and he feels afraid.

The silence feels wrong now. He used to love it in this house, but now all he can hear is the absence of other life, even though Keith’s slumbering right beside him. Like a prison. Like a cell.

A cell. Yes. That’s right. It’s right, and he knows it because his skin crawls with the wrongness of the realization. 

A cell.

He needs some air.

It’s the middle of the night. Keith’s still asleep beside him, apparently unbothered by Shiro’s restless twitching. Shiro gets out of bed as quietly as possible, taking care not to jostle Keith’s sprawled limbs. He’s never had to deal with a light sleeper in his bed before now, but he doesn’t think he minds the careful routine of trying not to disturb Keith. Tonight, though, the closeness suffocates him. He needs to get out. He needs to get out.

Images keep coming to mind, and he hates them all.

There’s something he needs to see.

Something familiar, half-remembered and important. He’s seen it before. He’s seen it in this house.

He heads out of the bedroom; he knows where he needs to go.

_ “Our champion!” the announcer calls, and there’s a chorus of savage cheers- _

Shiro flinches and leans against the door jamb for support. He clenches his fists, and confusion rushes through him when he doesn’t find the hilt of a blade in his hand. Shouldn’t he be holding a weapon?

Wait, that’s wrong-

Isn’t  _ he  _ the-

_ Matt, he has to save Matt, so he strikes him down- _

-the weapon?

Wait, that was Matt. Shiro clutches at his head, grasping desperately for the longer strands of his hair. The burn of his grip brings him back to clarity for a moment, and Shiro chases the thread of the memory into the great violet and black mass of the Kerberos mission at the back of his mind.

God, no, it hurts too much to remember, because everything from that time was pain.

Shiro stumbles onward.

In the dim living room, all of Keith’s sketches stare down at him from the walls. Shiro squints around at them, and his attention finds the sets of scattered cats’ eyes, pupilless and daunting.

Not cats, but-

The fear lances through him again, and he hurries toward his target, trying to ignore the burning gazes.

The rejected paintings are exactly where he last found them. All the better. Shiro’s not sure he’s got the mental strength to go looking for them. He shoves the rest of the paintings aside, and some of them clatter to the ground. Shiro winces at the sound but continues anyway. There’s no time to worry about waking anybody up. There’s just the sinking, clawing feeling in his gut, and the need to  _ check- _

The painting is exactly where he remembers it was. Shiro reaches out to touch the heavy dark fabric over it, and this time he recoils from the touch of it. Wasn’t he wearing something like this before-

Before-

He rips the cloth off the painting, and he stares down at Keith-who-is-not-Keith, violet and gold and dangerous.

_ Something’s wrong. _

He stares down at Keith’s painted golden eyes, and something in his mind screams that he is in  _ danger, danger, get out of there- _

“What are you doing?”

In the silence of the house, Keith’s voice goes off like a shot, loud and far closer than expected. He’s too close; he’s right by Shiro’s ear;  _ how did he sneak up on me- _

Shiro turns before he knows what’s happening, raising his right hand in an arc, and the room bursts into pink light. The hand - it’s never done this before, or maybe it has, because it feels violent and ugly and familiar - ignites. He goes with it, swinging his arm around with the full force he can muster towards the threat at his back. Neutralize, neutralize,  _ kill- _

It clangs against metal.

And in the light it sheds, Shiro realizes who he’s attacking.

It’s the painting come to life.

It’s Keith.

He’s breathing hard, holding off the violent fuschia force of Shiro’s hand, and in the light it’s clear to see how yellow his eyes are, all but swallowing up the violet of his irises. They’re slits now, like a cat’s, or like-

“Galra,” he snarls, because it all makes sense now, and the word jumps unbidden to his lips, familiar in the worst way. “I remember.”

He remembers.

All the faces in the stands, laughing down at him-

_ Champion- _

“Shiro,” Keith begs, voice rough. “Shiro, please, I can explain. Just let me talk to you.”

His voice is still the same, even if the eyes aren’t. The sound of it soothes him enough that Shiro nearly falters, but he still holds Keith off. Keith’s holding a small, slim dagger against the glowing pink of Shiro’s unnatural hand, fending him off through sheer force alone. Alien strength, Shiro realizes now. Alien, because Keith is Galra, and he never told Shiro.

“Why should I listen?” he asks, pressing forward. The hum of his hand - the Galra hand, because  _ they  _ gave it to him - fills his mind with the threat of violence. It could drown out everything else if he dared let it take over, masking any emotion so that he can kill this traitor the way it deserves. It would make a good show. They really must hate this Galra if they’d throw one of their own into the arena with him.

Wait.

Not the arena. He’s on Earth.

Why is a Galra on Earth?

Shiro stumbles back, still holding his weaponized hand aloft, keeping Keith at bay. His blood roars in his ears, urging him towards a fight. “What the fuck is going on?” he demands, voice rising to an impossible octave. 

Keith’s still in nothing but his underwear, holding what looks like a wickedly sharp violet dagger in his hands. In the dimness of the cabin, his yellow eyes gleam like poison. He doesn’t say anything.

“Coyotes,” Shiro spits, glaring at the knife. “It was all a lie. You came here to - to -”

He’s not sure.

“Shiro,” Keith begs again, but he gets no closer.

He also doesn’t put the knife down.

So he knows Shiro’s a threat. Good. Good.

“I can’t-” He cuts himself off when he finds he can’t speak. He clears his throat, realizing that there are tears blocking the path of his words. “Keith,” he says again, desperately. “I don’t know if I can trust you.”

He knows he can’t. Every Galra he’s ever met has been out to get him. All of them except-

Except-

“Shiro,” Keith says again, just as desperately. His voice is so, so familiar, and Shiro wants so badly to trust him, but all he can see is the face of every Galra who ever held him captive, and every one of them that he cut down. “I can explain.”

“More lies!” Shiro snarls.

“Hey. Hey. Takashi.”

The name cuts through the haze of everything that has ever gone wrong in his life. Nobody ever called him that in the arena. Only Champion. That was all he ever was to them.

Not to Keith. To Keith he’s Shiro. He’s Takashi.

But that could all be a ploy. 

“Don’t call me that,” Shiro orders roughly, and Keith flinches.

Good.

The Galra play games with their pets and with their minds. They take captives and they take limbs and the take lives, and they’ve been playing Shiro for a fool this whole time.

Was he ever really free?

He keeps the hand up in front of himself, backing away. “Keith,” he says, and he hates how much his voice shudders. His whole body shakes; it only feels natural to hunch in over himself. “Keith, I can’t stay here with you.”

Keith’s impossible eyes widen, and his dagger hand shakes. Shiro notices immediately; that’s a weakness he can exploit. A quick takedown isn’t as good of a show, but he just wants to get back to his cell and rest.

Wait.

_ No. _

He’s not in a cell. Or he doesn’t think so.

He needs to get out of here.

“I’m leaving,” Shiro says, forcing the words out around his desperate tears. “Fuck, I-”

He turns -  _ a weakness, don’t expose your back  _ \- and flees out the front door, leaping down the creaky stairs towards where their bikes are parked side by side.

Keith doesn’t follow him.

Shiro almost wishes he had; he could use a fight. It’s all he’s good for, right?

He vaults onto the first bike he reaches and revs it, peeling off into the desert at a truly reckless speed. He needs to get away from here; it doesn’t matter what it costs. And if he breaks, then the Galra lose another fighter, and they’ll need to replace their Champion. Their loss.

The bike obeys him with impressive speed. It doesn’t run like what he’s used to, and when he looks down he realizes he’s taken both sets of keys, and that he’s on Keith’s bike.

Fuck, fuck, he didn’t mean to, and now Keith has his bike-

At least that means Keith can’t follow him.

He rides as far away as he can. Far from the Galra, and far from the lies, and far from Keith.

When he manages to get inside the safety of the Garrison garage, panting around the exertion of forcing himself to concentrate, there are no stars in sight. Just humans, and synthetic lighting, and people who greet him as  _ Commander.  _ He sprints through the halls, thankful that it’s late enough that nobody will see him dressed for bed, barefoot and tearstained and desperate, and makes it to his quarters.

He leaves the lights on and curls up in bed, trying to stop his shaking.

There’s no purple in sight.

Shiro’s glad.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He joined the Garrison to fly.  
> That’s all he’s ever wanted in life. He’s wanted the sky and the stars and the rush of being beyond the reach of gravity. He’s lived for those heart-stopping seconds just before breaking atmo, when Earth still tries to cradle him close even as he leaves it behind. He’s always thought that he was going to spend his life rising through the skies and the ranks and eventually retiring somewhere among the stars.  
> He just wanted to fly.  
> And instead-  
> He looks down at his hands.

_“Keep running; we’re almost out. Just a little further, c’mon-”_

He wakes.

It’s not a pleasant awakening by any means. Consciousness rips him from the murky horrors of his past and into the unstable reality of the present. Shiro rubs his face with his human hand, wincing at the feeling of cold sweat all over. The sheets stick to him in all the wrong ways, tangled around his legs and his metal arm. Shiro pulls the hand out carefully, turning it over to make sure none of the fabric has gotten caught between the synthetic joints. He wouldn’t be surprised if it had. The thing’s a weapon, after all.

He clenches the fingers into a fist, trying to remember how he got the hand to weaponize and gleam bright pink. It must be locked in there somewhere with the rest of his muscle memory.

Nothing happens.

Maybe that’s for the best.

Trying to will the horrible images of his past out of his mind, Shiro rolls out of bed and begins to follow his usual morning routine. Shower. Brush teeth. Dry hair. Select uniform. Adjust fit. Check appearance.

Stare.

Shiro’s good enough at recognizing patterns to realize that he’s broken out of his usual one.

He scrubs a hand across his face, staring at his haggard appearance in the mirror, and briefly mourns how good he’d looked just last night. He’d been happy. He’d been the Garrison’s golden pilot, forgetful and loyal and perfect. He’d been their champion.

He joined the Garrison to fly.

That’s all he’s ever wanted in life. He’s wanted the sky and the stars and the rush of being beyond the reach of gravity. He’s lived for those heart-stopping seconds just before breaking atmo, when Earth still tries to cradle him close even as he leaves it behind. He’s always thought that he was going to spend his life rising through the skies and the ranks and eventually retiring somewhere among the stars.

He just wanted to fly.

And instead-

He looks down at his hands.

Instead, he’s become a killer.

That’s the simple fact of it, right? That’s what the Galra forced him to become. Kill or die. Kill or let others die for him.

_Matt’s terrified eyes blink up at him, and he scrabbles backwards, bleeding-_

He shakes his head as firmly as he can, trying to banish the image from his head. It’s becoming harder to stop the flashbacks; they come in waves more often than not, overwhelming and impossible to parse through. What he remembers of the flashes is bad enough that he doesn’t think it’s worth dwelling on. All he can do is weather out the storm of it and hope that he won’t come out of this with too strong a sense of self loathing.

He wasn’t trained to be a murderer, sure, but that’s what he became anyway.

“I had to survive,” he rasps to the open air. “I had to come back.”

For what? The Holts? For Adam? To warn Earth of the Galra? To buy them all more time?

And what did he sacrifice to do that?

How many?

Shiro buries his head in his hands, tugging desperately at the tuft of shock-white hair that falls between his fingers. He doesn’t know how many people he-

_“Champion!” the announcer calls, and the crowd roars its approval. Shiro steps out into the lights, shrugging his tattered purple shirt back over his shoulders, and tries to work the ache out of his joints. He had two fights yesterday, and the stimpacks the medics give him aren’t quite enough to dull the pain of the healing slash down his side. If he’s timed everything right, it’s late enough in the day that this should be his only fight of the day. He’ll have a bit more time to recover until they decide to bring him out again. A good performance should satisfy the crowds for at least a couple of days._

_Shiro acknowledges the cheers with a pump of his metallic fist in the air. He just hopes it won’t be a human. He hasn’t seen a human since the Holts were taken away, and if they bring any more, that means the Galra have found more._

_All they need is one human. Shiro can be enough to satisfy them. He’s their rarest breed, and he’ll keep it that way. If he’s useful, they won’t go looking for more._

_The gates across the arena slide open, and a guttural scream shatters the air._

_The crowd calls for their champion._

_And the Champion will answer._

_He drops into battle stance, ignites the weapon his captors gave him, and smiles._

Shiro frowns.

It’s no use.

Maybe he just needs a change of location. He needs to bury himself in his work, and in submitting his students’ grades on the rescue mission sims, and in anything that is within the walls of the facility and not the dark void of space.

That decides it. He collects his identification and fixes the buttons on his uniform, and he heads out into the hallways of the Garrison. There’s no more neutral place to go than to his office. He knows for a fact that one of Keith’s sketches is pinned up above the desk in the small office adjacent to his bedroom, and he’s not quite sure he can handle seeing that right now, so to the public one he goes.

It’s just how he left it before the gala: organized just the way he likes it, well-lit by the sun outside, and above all, quiet.

Except Commander Iverson is waiting for him.

“Tired?” he asks as Shiro places his bag down at the desk and sets up his tablet and documents for the grading protocols

“Not much.”

“If you’re sure.”

“I am.” Shiro sits down and starts pulling up his cadets’ sim runs, queuing them up for later. He meets Iverson’s gaze. “Did you need something?”

“I wanted you to submit the sim scores from the other day.”

Shiro expands his display so Iverson can see it. “Already on it.”

Iverson frowns at him. “Shirogane, you look like you saw a ghost. Did you hate the party that much?”

Shiro shakes his head. “No, I, uh. Just had a rough night. Did some soul searching.”

“Soul searching.” He doesn’t sound very convinced.

He’s committed to the lie now. “Y’know, seeing the painting put a lot of things into perspective for me. The whole Kerberos mission, and the aftermath.” Maybe it’s less of a lie than he’d thought.

Iverson squints at him. “Shirogane,” he says slowly. “The Kerberos mission?”

There’s a dangerous lilt to his voice when he says it. Maybe it’s not a threat, but Shiro’s on the lookout for any danger, and he can see that this is a fight waiting to happen. This is what they all sound like when they think he’s going crazy. This is how all the Garrison doctors all talk to him when they think he’s unstable and on the edge of a breakdown. This is what they sound like when they think he’s hiding things.

Well, Iverson’s not exactly wrong, but Shiro’s not going to give him the pleasure of knowing that.

So he just says, “No breakthroughs, unfortunately,” with his voice just on the right side of apologetic. It’s subtle, probably. Hopefully.

Iverson grunts and turns away, heading back out the door. “Make sure you get those sim scores in.”

“Copy.”

With an unintelligible mutter that might be a farewell, Iverson makes his way back into the hallway and into the depths of the Garrison base. He’s probably going to go reprimand some wayward cadets or scare them into doing some extra PT.

Well, Shiro figures, at least the cadets will be in good shape. He certainly remembers his own cadet days, and the endless hours spent in the gym and out beneath the too-hot sun, working his body towards perfection in service of Earth and the Galaxy Garrison. He’s pretty sure he met Adam on one of those days, and he’d teasingly told Shiro to _look alive, cadet-_

_champion-_

“Fuck,” he murmurs, putting his head in his hands. It seems that not even his rambling memories of the days long before Kerberos are safe from the encroaching reality of his stint with the Galra.

He clears his throat and returns to his work. He’s still got a duty to the Garrison, memories or not.

And of course he manages to submit the grades. He’s not a monster. The cadets need their grades.

When he’s done, he sets his tablet aside with a sigh, leaning back in his chair and staring around at the bare white and gray of his Garrison office. Despite the sunlight, it’s just not...welcoming. Not in an organic way. It’s just the same as every other room in the compound, sterile and pristine.

Come to think of it, it’s just like any other military base.

If the colors were changed, this could just as easily be a Galra ship.

Shiro bites his lip.

He almost considers going to Admiral Sanda.

He gets up and paces down the hallway outside his office, tugging anxiously at the cuffs of his uniform as he goes. It would be so easy to just report everything. That’s what he should do. That’s what any good officer of the Galaxy Garrison would do.

Maybe they’d let him fly again.

The thought of that alone sends his heart soaring.

His psychologists would be pleased with him. They’d have a field day, and they’d probably rip each other apart to get the chance to pick the brain of an escaped arena fighter from an alien civilization. If they’d ever let him go, then the strategists would get him next. They’d want schematics and they’d want to see him run battle simulations and they’d analyze every bit of his body to find the difference between where the Galra broke him and where they made him strong. They’d want Shiro to teach for them; they’d want every cadet in the Garrison to learn from the Galra’s Champion. The new class of cadets would graduate knowing every brutal way to kill a hundred different species.

And then they’d have to deal with the Galra.

They’d need evidence, of course. There must be something that goes beyond just the words of a former amnesiac. The Galaxy Garrison surely has had its suspicions, especially since the ship Shiro crashed in wasn’t the same as the usual escape pods that had been on the Kerberos exploration shuttle. They must suspect something happened. They must have their theories, whether they choose to share them with Shiro or not.

Would he just bring them out into the desert?

He can see it now: all the Garrison vehicles rushing up and kicking up dust around the little shack in the middle of nowhere. Most of them would be in hazard suits just like they had been when Shiro crash landed on Earth. Some of them would probably be armed. All of them, really. An alien operative in close contact with Garrison high command is a threat of global importance, after all.

In their search, they’d surely tear that house apart. All of Keith’s sketches and paintings and brushes would be taken down as evidence.

And Keith - they’d surely have to take Keith with a fight. He wouldn’t just let himself be stolen away from beneath the sky. Shiro’s fought enough Galra to have an idea of Keith’s feral beauty when he fights. It’s easy enough to picture the way Keith would rip as many officers to shreds as he could if it meant having even the barest chance of freedom.

He’d lose, of course. Eventually. The Garrison is many, and Keith is just one.

Would Shiro be there to watch him fall?

Shiro imagines Keith in quarantine like he’d been, separated from the world by inches of impenetrable glass. He’d be alone. His mother - wherever or whatever she is - probably wouldn’t even know what happened to him. Keith would have nobody.

Because Shiro gave him up.

He remembers Keith’s anger, so long ago, when Shiro had mentioned the Garrison doesn’t let him fly anymore. Then he tries to imagine Keith caged like that, forbidden from ever taking his bike out for daredevil races beneath the stars. He tries to imagine Keith without starlight, locked in the heart of the Garrison for the rest of his life.

It hurts.

He can’t let the Garrison take that.

Not that house.

Not Keith.

“Commander Shirogane?”

Shiro blinks and shakes his head, pulling himself back into focus, and realizes with startling swiftness that he’s face to face with Admiral Sanda.

“Oh!” he manages to bark out, and he steps back with a hasty salute.

He’d walked on autopilot to Admiral Sanda’s office anyway.

She raises an eyebrow - wow, Keith really did perfectly capture the severity of her eyes in his painting - and asks, “Is there a reason you’ve decided to stop by and visit, or is this more of a leisure stroll, Commander?”

Shiro laughs a bit, soft and apologetic. “Admiral, I was just lost in thought, to be perfectly honest.”

“Hm.” She nods curtly. “Be on your way then, Commander. Just because you have a portrait now doesn’t mean you’ve been given complete freedom.”

Ruefully, Shiro says, “Don’t I know it,” and he gives another salute before striding far, far away from the admiral.

He supposes it could have gone worse.

 

He doesn’t go to his office. To try to work out his feelings in the training room feels like suicide, and his bedroom holds nothing but instrospection and reminders of every lie he’s been living. The thought of going to the cafeteria and attempting to eat food just makes him nauseous.

So he doesn’t go.

Instead, he goes and runs the Kerberos rescue sim.

This is the closest he gets to flying nowadays.

Shiro runs all of the checks himself. The sim’s not the same model as the Kerberos shuttle, but he’s been helping to run this simulation since he got back to Earth. If there’s anything he knows, it’s how to pilot a mission to save a ship that never crashed.

_Pilot error._

He can’t help but laugh. It was a good excuse. He fucked up one way or another.

He steers away from the gorge where the sim announces that the Kerberos shuttle has crashed, instead urging the ship towards the sky. The simulated g-forces hold him down in his chair, and the indicators flash red, but Shiro continues. Sure, this ship doesn’t want to scream back out of atmo, but he’s not going to let that stop him.

He just wants to see the stars.

Higher and higher he climbs, pushing himself out of the simulated gravity and away from the frigid wasteland of Kerberos. This place is too far from the sun for comfort. Maybe that’s why the Galra took them; they knew a good isolated target when they saw one.

Shiro urges his shuttle out past the gravitational pull of Kerberos, scanning the skies desperately. Maybe if he looks hard enough, he’ll find the ship that took him. Maybe he can stop this; maybe he can make this right, and the Holts will be okay, and the Galra will never take him, and they’ll never take his arm, and they’ll never call him Champion-

“Shirogane.”

The lights in the cockpit flicker back on, startlingly bright, and the sim screen goes dark. Shiro jolts and turns, already halfway to standing out of his chair, and meets Commander Iverson’s gaze once more.

He doesn’t look amused. “What are you doing in the Kerberos cadet sim?”

“Just running QA checks, sir.” He smiles as winningly as he can manage.

“Iverson. We discussed this, Shirogane.” He glances down at the tablet in his hand that must be controlling the sim. “And you were flying. Past atmo. Doesn’t seem like QA to me.”

Shiro drops his gaze for a moment. “Just restless,” he murmurs.

“Y’know, I just heard an interesting report from one of our garage techs. He reports you speeding in here in the middle of the night on an unregistered speeder _in your underwear._ Is there an explanation for that?”

Shiro’s heart sinks. “There is,” he manages, voice tight. Is he still smiling?

“And?”

He hesitates.

“Commander Shirogane,” another voice says, and Admiral Sanda steps into view, hands clasped behind her back. “Your behavior today has been alarming.”

Shiro looks back and forth between the two of them, holding his metal arm behind his back under pretense of respect. It’s clenched in a fist, though, and trembling with the force of how hard he’s holding it. There’s too much going on in his mind, and he can’t be cornered by these two right now.

The Garrison doesn’t trust him.

What’ll they do to him now?

“I’ll be back,” he says, and he brushes past the both of them, ignoring their calls of protest. Maybe they pull rank, but he’s not listening.

He can’t take the silence of the Garrison. He can’t handle the quiet industrial order of it, so similar to a Galra ship that he could almost scream. This isn’t the peace he needs. This place won’t give him answers. The Garrison is just as full of lies as the Galra; they have nothing for him now. If he tells them anything, they’ll destroy it all, and then he’ll never know the full truth of what happened on Kerberos.

Keith would never tell them what they need to know.

_Keith._

That’s the answer.

He has to go back.

On instinct, his steps take him back down towards the hangar where he’d parked the bike late last night. Shiro doesn’t even bother to go back to his room; there’s not much there but his old brown jacket, but maybe he can retrieve that later. If he comes back, that is.

On his way through the hangar, he drops his communicator into one of the waiting cubbies near his spot, leaving it behind for the Garrison to find. They’d be able to track him if he had it.

It’ll take them a while to figure out where he is.

He runs his hand along the shining red metal of Keith’s bike. He won’t be able to drive it with anything near the recklessness Keith manages to pull off, but he’s pretty sure he got close last night.

“Commander?” someone asks from across the hangar, nervous and confused, and Shiro ignores them.

He slings his leg over the bike, revs it to life, and rockets off into the desert, getting far, far away from the Galaxy Garrison.

Nobody gives chase, as far as he can tell. Maybe they’re hoping he’ll come back on his own.

Why does he keep running away?

He hunches further over the bike, revs it, and picks up speed, kicking up dust in his wake on the way to Keith’s house. There’s no point dwelling on that. One thing at a time. One challenge at a time.

Right now, the challenge is returning to Keith and asking for answers.

The shack’s quiet when he pulls up near it; there’s no sign of life save for the meager plants trying their best to sway in the wind kicked up by the hoverbike. Shiro parks it carefully beside his own - Keith doesn’t seem to have touched it. Shiro pats the seat of it in a little greeting, and briefly the worn leather fills him with a sense of comfort. But the moment passes with the sound of the house creaking and settling just a short distance away, and Shiro steels himself for what’s to come.

Now or never.

The stairs creak in the familiar way they always have. In the oppressive, feral silence of the desert, the sound is almost calming. This place has always been safe to him, hasn’t it? This house has always been the place he’s escaped to, not the one he must escape from.

He hopes that can still be true.

God, he wishes he could just have that back.

The upside of having the stairs so loud is that Keith can almost certainly hear him coming. He can be prepared for Shiro too - Shiro figures he should allow him that courtesy. There’s no audible sound from inside the house, though.

Shiro approaches the front door. He raises his hand to knock.

But-

He hesitates.

What if Keith’s already left?

What if he’s given Shiro up as a lost cause or a liability or a waste of time?

But that’s a chance he has to take. He made it all the way out here; he came back. He’ll never know if he doesn’t knock.

So he knocks.

And waits.

Keith opens the door after thirty seconds of silence.

Through the small crack between the doorjamb and the door, the faint glow of Keith’s eyes is immediately apparent. Shiro swallows but does not run. This is still Keith, after all. Keith had every opportunity to kill him before, and he never did. Shiro’s determined to give him a chance.

Keith blinks and lets the door swing open a bit more, revealing the faint lavender cast to his skin and the way he’s still dressed in not much more than an oversized tee and some underwear. Has he even bothered to take care of himself since Shiro ran out? He says, “You came back.”

Did he not expect him to? Shiro replies, “I need answers.”

There’s a moment when he thinks that Keith might just shut the door on him. There’s something shuttered and impassive in his gold and violet eyes, and it makes him even harder to inspect.

“You’re still Galra.”

“I always have been.” Keith opens the door a little further, baring his full body to Shiro instead of hiding behind the wood. “No use in keeping up an illusion.”

Shiro stares at him, and at the open door.

It’s an invitation. Not a challenge.

Shiro takes it.

He steps through the door and into Keith’s home, inhaling the familiar scents of turpentine and coffee that have always permeated the old wood. Despite his misgivings, he relaxes a little bit, slipping into the comfortable sense memory of this place. The house never did anything to harm him, after all. Keith gives him a wide berth but still watches him carefully; his golden eyes gleam in the dusty gloom of the house.

Shiro takes a breath, composing himself, and meets Keith’s cat-bright eyes. He misses the violet in them. He says, “You lied to me.”

“By omission.”

“Still a lie. You still hid from me.” He can already hear his own voice rising, and he takes a deep breath to quell his anger. He doesn’t want to yell. He doesn’t want to be that person again. That thing in the arena wasn’t him. It can’t be him. It won’t be him.

Keith doesn’t drop his gaze. “I did.”

“And you just let me believe that everything was fine. Pilot error.” He huffs out a soft, bitter laugh. “All the lies.”

“So you remember,” Keith says flatly. He’s keeping his distance now, stepping back and further into the house, keeping out of Shiro’s way.

Shiro nods jerkily. “Bits and pieces.”

“Does it hurt?” Keith asks. When Shiro makes a confused, wordless sound, he clarifies, “Your head. Does the remembering hurt? I have medpacks.”

“I - no. No, I’m fine.” He’s been through worse. Now he _knows_ that he’s been through worse.

Keith gestures to the armchair. “You can sit if it makes it better.”

Shiro eyes the chair warily. It’s familiar enough; it’s where all of this started. He decides, “No.” He’s not going to destroy those fond memories with the full weight of the Kerberos mission. There are some things he’s determined to keep sacred. “Can we go somewhere else?”

“Bedroom?” Keith suggests. It’s probably the place with the smallest amount of dangers. The kitchen’s a disaster waiting to happen, and the bathroom’s not the place for this, which really only leaves the bedroom.

With a quick nod, Shiro makes his way to the hallway. Keith follows but then hangs back a little bit, letting Shiro go first. The first movement must’ve been on instinct; Shiro still half-expects him to hook his chin over his shoulder and complain about a client as they go. But he doesn’t, and Shiro’s shoulder remains cold. It’s like they’re back to square one, dancing around each other again.

God, it all went so wrong.

He pushes his way past the half-closed door and into the bedroom. It hurts his heart to see the tousled sheets there, and all of the pieces of his clothing that have accumulated on the floor and furniture over the months they’ve known each other.

They’d just been there. They’d been happy.

Shiro clenches his jaw against the threat of rising tears. There’ll be time for sadness later. He turns to Keith, ignoring the startled jolt of his heart at the sight of alien eyes. _It’s Keith,_ he reminds himself. _Still Keith._

Still Galra.

He asks, “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Any number of things could have happened.” Keith’s voice is still flat, still verging on the edge of emotionless. Shiro recognizes that tone: the careful detachedness of a soldier giving a briefing. Controlled. Repressed. “You might not have believed me. You might have attacked me. You might have gone to the Garrison. The Galra could have found you.” His eyes tick over to Shiro, carefully shuttered. “I could go on.”

“What about this?” Shiro asks desperately, gesturing between the two of them. “Did you even think about what would happen between us? What it would do?”

Keith’s golden gaze is steady. “Every day.”

“Every day,” Shiro repeats. He shakes his head. “You just - were you waiting for something? Were you ever going to say a thing?”

“It killed me, Shiro.” There it is for a moment: the barest hint of a crack. Keith’s still in there somewhere. Maybe he’s hurting as much as Shiro is.

The bitter, angry part of Shiro is glad for that.

“And you kept up the lie anyway. Why? You’re only here because you - because you _have_ to be? Because you’re watching me? Are you going to take me back to them now that I’m a threat again?” Now that he remembers, and now that he remembers that he used to fight, and that the Galra are out there, and that they know that this solar system contains a planet ripe for the taking?

Keith shakes his head firmly. “I’m not with the Galra.” There’s a flicker of emotion again. Not anger, but insistence. Desperation. Loathing.

“You’re-”

“Half.” Keith tosses his hair out of his eyes. “Half Galra, and I’m not with the empire.” He fixes Shiro with his predator’s gaze. “I swear that I’m not with the people who put you in chains. There are Galra who hate what the empire does.” He pauses. “And what they did to you.”

“You know what they did?” Shiro asks. And then, softly, “You know what I did?”

By the way Keith’s frown deepens, the answer is clear enough.

Shiro stares down at his hands, then back at Keith. “How can you-”

_How can you stand to look at me?_

Keith answers the question he must know Shiro’s asking. “Because I know it wasn’t what you wanted to do.”

“I just wanted to go home,” Shiro whispers, and he thinks he might start crying.

“Shiro,” Keith murmurs, and Shiro’s breath hitches at the sound. He reaches out a hand to Shiro, tentative and half-instinctual, before he holds back. Shiro’s left alone, wondering if he’d have liked it better if Keith had gone through with it.

He misses Keith’s easy comfort.

Instead of offering a claw-tipped touch, Keith says, “I need to show you something.”

Shiro makes an attempt to swipe the tears from his eyes and nods.

Keith walks to his nightstand and picks up the dark sheath that he keeps there. Shiro flinches and raises his right hand on instinct; the soft filtered light of the bedroom is briefly supplemented by the flickering magenta glow of the weaponized arm. Keith’s predator eyes narrow, and his hand twitches like he’s about to leap at him, but he halts and waits.

Shiro shudders. “I-”

He doesn’t bother to finish. He’s not sure what he wants to say.

“I understand.” Keith takes his hand off the sheathed blade and sets it back down, holding his hands up. “Take the time you need.” He steps back and leans against the wall, and he falls into the soft, simple posture of the painter Shiro’s always known. It’s disconcerting in the most bittersweet way, because that’s _Keith,_ and Shiro knows it, but his raised hands have clawed fingers and his eyes are yellow and his skin blushes lavender. It’s Keith, and it always has been, but now Shiro understands, and it just hurts to look at him.

Eventually, the desperate thudding in his chest subsides enough for him to say, “I’m ready.”

Keith nods and picks up the sheath once more, carefully sliding the blade out at a slow enough speed that Shiro’s instincts don’t send him spiraling. It’s the same dagger that he used to hold Shiro’s metal hand off last night; it must be strong. The distant, rational part of Shiro appreciates the blade for its craftsmanship. “This is my blade,” Keith says, turning it over in his hands as he walks over to Shiro. He’s holding it loosely, not at all in a threatening way, and for that, Shiro’s grateful. “I’ve had it nearly all my life. It never leaves me. It’s part of me, and of my duty. My family.”

“This is what you wanted to show me?” Shiro asks. An alien weapon? What memory does he hope to jog with this? He’s seen enough violence to last a lifetime; one knife isn’t going to stand out.

Keith shakes his head. “There’s more. The wardrobe. I have something there that I think you might recognize.” He steps past Shiro, still giving him a wide berth, and reaches out with his free hand to open the wardrobe. He looks back at Shiro, running his fingers down the handle of the wooden door. “Do you trust me?” he asks softly.

Shiro’s heart aches for him. “I-”

Keith nods; the steely soldier’s demeanor snaps back into place. “I understand.”

“No, Keith, I-” He stops and chooses his words as carefully as he can manage. “I want to,” he murmurs, and he hopes that’s enough.

It is.

Maybe he’s imagining it, but something like a smile creeps into Keith’s golden eyes. It’s gone again in a heartbeat, but for a second Shiro knows he’s seen it. That alone has him daring to hope. He’d recognized Keith in that face, and in those eyes.

Keith opens the wardrobe and shoves aside a bunch of shirts and sweaters, revealing a little door at the back. He pulls it open, and in the darkened depths of the wardrobe, there hangs a single garment.

It’s dark blue and gray and violet, full length by the look of it. A suit of some sort.

And it’s familiar.

Shiro reaches out and feels the fabric between his fingers. Just as he’d expected, it has the same heavy softness as the cloth that covered the painting of Keith in his true Galra form.

Quietly, after letting Shiro inspect it for a few moments, Keith asks, “Do you know what this is?”

He thinks he might. He doesn’t know if he wants to.

He has to. He has to know.

Mouth dry, Shiro says, “Put it on.”

Keith stares at him, wordless and sad, and pulls the clothing down from its hanger.

Shiro waits.

Keith shudders, just once, and puts his dagger down on the ground where Shiro can see it. The rational, military part of Shiro appreciates the gesture. Keith shrugs out of his oversized tee - wait, no, that’s Shiro’s shirt that he’s wearing - and lets it fall to the ground. In the dim light, his pale skin glows, and against it his darker marks stand out. Keith had called them birthmarks, but now Shiro recognizes them for what they are. They’re far too symmetrical to be chance differences in pigmentation. The truth is laughably easy to point out now: the reddish-purple paint strokes of color along his shoulders and hips are stripes. Galra markings, identifying Keith as one of them. As Galra.

As a liar.

Keith knows he’s looking, because Shiro doesn’t have anything near the presence of mind to hide the way he stares. He doesn’t look up to meet Shiro’s eyes, instead reaching for the uniform and stepping into each of the legs. It’s skin tight, clinging to every familiar curve and angle of his body. With every inch of fabric that covers him, he slips out of recognizability and into the anonymity of a uniform. A uniform - yes, that’s what this is. Shiro knows. Somehow, he knows.

Yes.

Yes, this is familiar.

But not in the way he expected.

The sight of the dark gray-blue-purple blend of fabric and armor doesn’t send bile rising in his throat the way he’d figured it would. It doesn’t bring up the dread that’s brewing between his bones with every memory that’s forcing its way out of obscurity. It doesn’t remind him of prison, or of pain, or of crowds calling for their champion.

It’s Keith, dark and violet and dangerous, but somehow Shiro still feels safe.

“This is what I am,” Keith says raggedly, blinking at Shiro from behind the black fall of his hair.

Shiro shakes his head. “There’s something more,” he says. The disjointed memories spur him onwards. “I thought there was more to the uniform.”

“Shiro-”

“I need to see it,” Shiro insists firmly. “Keith, please. Show me.”

For a moment, he thinks that Keith won’t do it. There’s a deep, dark sadness gleaming in his golden eyes. But Keith takes a deep breath, closes his eyes, and pulls the uniform’s gray hood over his head. It hides his dark hair from the light, casting his face into shadow. Were his eyes not closed, the yellow glow of them would surely be the only thing Shiro could see. But there’s shame written all over Keith’s face, and he raises a hand that looks clawed even through his gloves, pressing it to a button on the side of his neck. A mask flickers into existence over his face with a dull electrical hum, shrouding Keith’s face in dark metal.

The recognition hits him like a knife to the stomach.

Distantly, he realizes that he knows exactly what that feels like.

Keith’s golden eyes are hidden now, replaced instead by twin beacons of violet light. Unblinking, they stare out at Shiro. “Now do you remember?” he asks, and his voice has changed, hidden behind a mechanical echo that distorts his words past recognition.

Shiro knows this voice too.

_“Don’t ask any questions. Just follow me. I’m gonna get you home, okay?”_

The memory comes unbidden to his mind, echoing with the same cadence as Keith’s voice. Shiro gasps around the force of it, and the clarity. He doesn’t even realize he’s talking until he feels the rasp of the words against his aching throat. “How did I - how did I not realize it was you?” he asks. How could he not have remembered Keith?

“Yurak,” Keith says simply.

That’s familiar too. “Yurak,” Shiro echoes. “The ship. You told me your name-” He stops. Considers. Stares. “Keith,” he says, and something in his heart swells and aches and loves, “that was you.”

_“Can you walk? I’m Yurak; Ulaz got you out. Just hold on to me and I’ll fly us out of here.”_

The glowing eyes of the mask shine out at him. Keith nods, still silent.

Shiro would say that he can’t believe it, but after everything he’s seen, and all the things he’d forgotten he’s experienced, this is the most sure he’s ever been. This is the one fact he can trust. “You saved me,” he murmurs. He steps forward, and Keith almost flinches backwards. Even though he’s hidden behind the mask, his wide eyes are easy to imagine. Shiro carefully puts his hands up, and Keith’s posture stops looking quite so much like that of a wounded animal.

That’s a start. They’re both scared. That’s okay.

This is okay.

Shiro reaches out, puts his hands on the cheeks of the mask, and repeats, “You saved me.”

He leans in and kisses the mask.

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [I drew the art for this part!](http://www.earthspaladins.tumblr.com/post/178150808823/cover-your-c-r-y-s-t-a-l-e-y-e-s)


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shiro remembers.

_ There’s no time to think about it. There’s just the rhythm of the guards’ movements, the rushing of his blood in his ears, and the warm nonthreatening presence of Ulaz by his side. Normally Shiro would chafe at having a Galra soldier so close, towering over him, but he doesn’t feel that way about Ulaz. It’s been a while since he’s trusted anybody. _

_ For now, though, they’ve cornered themselves in a hangar. The sounds from outside indicate that at least a few soldiers have figured out where they are. There’s surely not much time. Shiro crouches on the ground behind a stack of crates, cradling his metal hand to his chest. He should be fighting, right? _

_ “Wait here. There will be another soldier of ours soon. Follow him,” Ulaz whispers in his ear. “He will take you home.” _

_ Shiro looks back at him, opening his mouth in a silent, desperate question. There are too many variables; there are too many ways to lose. _

_ Ulaz shakes his head and places a long finger on his lips, bending to meet his eyes. “There’s no time. You’re getting a second chance. Be safe.” He stands to his full height and takes out a gun-like weapon that Shiro hasn’t even noticed, narrowing his eyes as he turns to the hangar entrance. The gruff yells in the Galra tongue filter through the metal doors, and Ulaz answers them with a muttered curse in the same language. Ulaz nods once more at Shiro and runs off in the direction of the doors. _

_ Shiro presses himself back against the crates and tries not to panic. _

_ It mostly works. _

_ He’s not sure how long he waits.  _

_ It’s unpleasant the whole time. Shiro’s all too aware of the shaking rhythm of his own breathing, and the sounds of fighting and yelling explode out from behind him. He hopes, distantly, that Ulaz will be okay. _

_ Footsteps approach his little haven. They’re not coming from the same direction in which Ulaz ran off, which means someone’s trying to get the jump on him. He goes to ignite his weaponized hand, heart thudding in his chest. Outside of the arena, fighting feels wrong. He shouldn’t be doing this. _

_ But he must. _

_ He tenses, raises his eyes, and prepares to fight. _

_ But then the person rounds the corner and stops short, and Shiro isn’t sure what to think. _

_ This one’s uniform isn’t like what most Galra soldiers wear. _

_ It’s hard not to notice the difference when he’s seen the outfits of his captors for months on end. There’s none of the brutal reddish glow of an insignia on this one’s chest. Instead, this masked Galra soldier stands no higher than Shiro’s height, clad in blue and gray and violet, bending down to hold out a hand to him. _

_ Shiro stares. _

_ Softly, the creature asks, “Can you walk? I’m Yurak; Ulaz got you out. Just hold on to me and I’ll fly us out of here.” _

_ Shiro rasps, “I-” _

_ More insistently, the fingers in front of him twitch. There’s impatience in there for sure. “Come on,” he orders, and his voice, though changed by his mask, sounds desperate. “We need to go now.” _

_ Does he really have any other choice? _

_ He takes Yurak’s hand. _

He’s not sure why he expected the scent of starlight.

So close to the mask, closer to Keith than he’s been in a day and still further than he’s been in months, Shiro tries to find meaning in this communion. He’d meant for it to be - he’s not sure, really. But it’s a comfort, maybe, to feel the proof of his memories against him, intimately close. He’s not crazy. He’s not broken. He’s not angry.

And that’s the real relief: he’s not angry, and Keith isn’t pulling away.

The mask is solid and blessedly real. It’s cold beneath his lips, but the urge to keep himself in this moment is too strong for him to stop now. 

Distantly, and so, so close, Keith breathes in sharply, the sound of it filtering through the mask. Shiro takes it as encouragement and leaves his lips on the cool smooth material for a moment longer, and maybe he hears an answering sigh. 

Hope is a long shot, but he dares to do it anyway.

Shiro draws back a bit, taking a slow breath in. The cool air clears his head a bit, or maybe it’s the easy comfort of having Keith here. Because it is still Keith, after all, mask or not. Still Keith, despite the lies.

He swipes his thumbs along the smooth lines of the mask, letting his fingers obscure the bright violet light of the lines on the cheeks. There’s a bit of pressure on his right hand as he does it. If he’s not dreaming, and he hopes he isn’t, he thinks Keith’s pressing his face into the touch. He takes solace in that and takes in another shuddering breath.

Still, Keith remains silent.

“There are a lot of things I don’t know,” Shiro says, “but what I do know is that I remember you. Parts of you.” His head is still a mess of rubble that might one day let itself become a home again, but not yet. For now, he has to deal with the pieces. “And I need to know it all. I think you can help me.” And then, desperately, “I think you’re the only one who can.”

Or the only one alive.

The faintest sound makes its way through the mask, mechanically distorted. A sigh, maybe, or a choked-back hitch of breath.

Shiro waits.

Keith reaches up and takes him by the wrists, gently guiding Shiro’s hands away from the mask. There’s the barest pinprick of clawtips against the skin of his wrists, more incidental than anything. Shiro sucks in a breath, half expecting the cold tightness of shackles to accompany the pressure, but the warmth of Keith’s hands banishes the fear. 

He doesn’t want to lose that comfort again.

But Keith lets go of his hands, reaching up instead to press the button for his mask.

It flickers out, and there’s Keith once more.

His scleras still are bright gold, and there’s a pale lavender cast to his skin. Faintly, now that he’s looking and focusing, he can see darker markings striping up his cheeks. Shiro would almost think he was merely blushing if he didn’t know the actual truth. If he didn’t know what the Galra were, or what happened, or that he came back to Earth because of Keith. 

Wait.

Not Keith.

The other name. His real name, maybe.

“Yurak,” Shiro murmurs.

Keith’s eyes squeeze shut for a moment; glassiness glints at the outer corners, threatening to spill down his cheeks. One does, tracing a dark path along his smooth lavender skin. It’s tempting to think about reaching out and wiping the tear away. The salt water of Earth seems out of place on the face of a man from the stars.

But Shiro doesn’t make a move, and no more tears fall. Keith reaches up on his own to rub at his cheek and smear the evidence away. “That’s my name,” he says at last. “One of them, at least.”

Shiro repeats, “Yurak.” His voice tilts up at the end, making its way towards a question he doesn’t understand yet.

“You don’t have to call me that.”

“But you-”

“I know what I am,” Keith interrupts.

“Could you…” He trails off and licks his lips, wringing his hands to keep from lashing out or taking Keith’s hand. “Could you tell me again?”

In another world, maybe this would be their introduction. Maybe this could be the first time they meet, and Keith would just be some incredible unknown creature from the stars. In that world, Shiro would be the human who was just lucky enough to meet him, out here in the desert where steel and order have no home.

But this world is a colder one, and Shiro has killed his way to survival, and Keith took him home.

Somehow.

Keith bites his lip, and that’s when the last of his mask cracks, leaving only the raw, feral emotions in his eyes. “My name is Keith,” he says raggedly, and all of the careful detached control is gone from him. The soldier is gone. It’s just Keith; it’s always been Keith. “I was born on Earth when my mother crash landed here and fell in love with my father. My father died helping her on her mission, and she took me back to space with her. She raised me with a Galra name and taught me to fight, and I’ve been fighting the empire all my life.”

That sounds right.

It sounds comforting.

After all, how could he imagine Keith as anything other than a spitfire, desperate to protect anything beautiful still in the universe?

Shiro rasps, “Help me remember.”

Keith’s breath comes out in a shuddering sigh. “Are you sure?”

“I need to know.” He has to fill in the blanks. “I can’t do this alone.”

“You won’t,” Keith promises. “I’m here.”

“You’ve always been here,” Shiro murmurs, because that feels like the right thing to say. “Haven’t you?”

A pause, and Keith nods.

That’s all he needs.

Finally, Keith says, “I was running routine flight missions for my group. Nothing out of the ordinary. My mom didn’t want me doing missions because she thought I was too young.” He shrugs. “But war doesn’t wait. So I flew.”

Despite his aching sadness, Shiro smiles. That sounds like Keith. That sounds like how he used to be too. 

Keith says, “We heard about the Champion.” He casts his glowing eyes downwards, focusing on Shiro’s false arm. “About their newest prize.”

The smile fades from Shiro’s heart as swiftly as it’d appeared. He clenches his metal fingers and asks, “People...people knew?”

“How else would they know to come see you in the arena?”

Shiro bites his lip and nods jerkily. A tear wells in the corner of his eye, but he blinks it away furiously.

Quietly, Keith mutters something that must be a curse under his breath. It’s in what Shiro now recognizes as the Galra tongue, low and snarled and full of anger. Keith closes his eyes, looking away for a second and seems to snap himself back out of it. He meets Shiro’s gaze once more. “I’m sorry, Shiro. You never deserved this. Any of this.”

“But is happened, didn’t it?” He lifts one shoulder in a defeated shrug. “So I’m dealing with it.”

“Doesn’t mean I have to enjoy watching you go through it.” Keith’s scowl is back, and that alone is endearingly familiar. That’s Keith through and through; the only difference is that now his teeth are pointed.

Shiro sighs. He waits until the threat of tears has passed before asking, “And what next?”

“When my mother heard that the Champion was taken from Earth’s solar system, she knew that something had to be done.” He shrugs. “So she sent me.”

His mind is too scrambled to make sense of the timeline of his memories, and it conjures up one Galra instead of the other. Another who chose to save him. Before Keith. Before-

_ Ulaz is tall, even by Galra standards. He’s got none of the imposing bulk that most of Shiro’s handlers have. That’s the first thing Shiro notices. It’s second nature now to try to figure out how quickly he can take people down. Even having a Galra warrior so close has his blood rushing in his ears, but the stress of sneaking through the halls certainly isn’t helping. Ulaz, skinny as he may be, still carries himself like he knows how to kill, and that’s either going to significantly increase or decrease Shiro’s odds of surviving this escape. _

_ He’s got kind eyes, though, and that’s what Shiro holds on to. He likes to think he’s a good judge of character. _

_ It’s also why he tries not to look his opponents in the eye in the arena. _

_ Tried. He’s getting out. He has to. The empire is looking for something, and he has to warn Earth about how they’re looking for- _

“Shiro.”

He blinks out of it, looking up and expecting to see the towering mass of the first of his saviors. Nothing. Just the ceiling. Course correction: he readjusts his gaze, focusing down on Keith and his eyes of violet and gold.

“Your eyes,” he murmurs before he can stop himself. He reaches out and tugs at the heavy fabric of the hood, pulling it down to reveal the inky starfall of Keith’s hair. “Your face. The colors - they changed. You’ve changed.”

“I’ve always been like this. The change isn’t that much of a difference.” Keith’s eyes slip shut, letting his long lashes sweep down in a dark line towards his cheeks. “It’s convenient to look human, especially when you’re stuck on Earth.”

“And now?” Shiro tucks an errant lock of hair back for Keith, marveling at the new downy softness along the shell of his ear.

“It’s easy enough to pass as human, but I was raised Galra. Sometimes it’s hard to control,” Keith says. “Strong emotions trigger the change. Anger. Pain. Fear.”

“No good emotions?” Shiro asks, and he reaches down for one of Keith’s hands. Keith lets him take it, and Shiro twines their fingers together, shivering when Keith’s claw tips gently rasp against the back of his hand. He’s holding back; the quaking of his hand shakes Shiro down to the bones.

Keith shakes his head. “None so far.”

And none right now, then. “Do you fear me now?” Shiro asks. Keith would be right to fear the Champion. “Hate me? Did I hurt you?” Part of him begs Keith to say yes. Part of him wants nothing more than for Keith to snarl in his face and condemn him for his ungratefulness and call him broken. He’d deserve it. 

Something broken and upset glints in Keith’s unfamiliar eyes. “Shiro,” he says, and there’s that desperate edge in his tone too. “I could never hate you.”

“Keith-”

“No, Shiro,” Keith interrupts, and in that moment he seems taller. Regal. Ethereal. “You listen to me. I could never hate you.”

Shiro ducks his head. “Keith,” he murmurs again, unsure of how to follow the small prayer of his name.

“Can you look at me?” Keith asks gently.

He’s not sure. “Keith.” It’s the easiest thing from his lips right now, conveying emotion where words don’t come quickly to mind.

“Shiro.” Equally tender. Equally meaningful. Shiro hears a whole speech condensed into the syllables.

He meets Keith’s eyes, and he realizes he’s relieved to see the gold.

“Listen to me,” Keith says, serious and slow. “You’re the best thing that ever happened to me.” He pauses, and then tilts his head to the side, and for a moment his lips tilt up in a sad half grin, revealing sharp fangs. “You’re my perfect subject, remember?”

Shiro’s heart stutters and stops, then soars back to life. “Keith.”

“I wouldn’t lie about that.” Keith places his other hand atop Shiro’s where they’re already holding each other. “You surprised me when you went on the attack. That’s it.”

“That’s it?”

Firmly, Keith nods. “That’s it.”

“But you already had the knife ready,” Shiro says. “Did you know?” Another thought rises to the surface, treacherous and ugly. “Did you expect that I’d attack?”

Keith bites his lip. “It wasn’t hard to sense your distress. I could tell from the second I woke up. The knife was a precaution.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’d never hurt you,” Keith promises. “Not on purpose. And I know you’d never hurt me. It’s not like you.”

“How can you be so sure?” Shiro asks. How can Keith just  _ trust? _

A little ghost of a smile crosses Keith’s lips. “Sometimes you just know from the moment you meet someone.”

_ “Do you have a name?” Yurak asks him at last, long after they’ve spiraled out of the empire’s reach. Their ship is shaking a bit, and something smells vaguely like it’s burning, but it seems like they’re both trying to ignore that. _

_ “Shiro,” he manages to say, and it’s the first thing in a long time that hasn’t been a scream. It’s probably the worst decision he’s made so far. The Galra consume everything they can get; names are no different.  _

_ But there’s something in his chest that feels like trust, and he lets it guide him. _

_ “Shiro,” Yurak repeats. It’s the first time Shiro’s heard his own name in what must be months; he’s lost track of the exact passage of time. Regardless, the sound of it in the soft electronic rap of his savior’s voice sends chills down his spine. “We don’t have anyone with names like that where I’m from.” _

_ “And where are you from?” Shiro asks, emboldened. He’s given everything to this Galra now; what else is he risking but his life? _

_ Maybe he’s imagining it, but Shiro thinks he hears Yurak chuckle. There’s certainly a more musical note in his tone when he replies, “That’s classified.” _

_ “Really?” _

_ “Really.”  _

_ “But really. Where?” _

_ Yurak turns and looks at him - really looks at him - with those impassive glowing synthetic eyes. Shiro nearly shrinks beneath his gaze, but he doesn’t feel threatened. Finally, Yurak says, “Closer than you’d think,” and turns back to the controls. _

_ “D’you know where you’re going?” Shiro asks. This ship is going impossibly fast; it’s better than anything the Garrison has for sure. The dormant, long-muffled part of him that once dreamed of the stars stirs to life in his chest. The return of it makes him warmer. Maybe he could fly this ship if they make it out alive. _

_ The masked Galra tilts his head towards him. At the controls, his clawed fingers twitch like they’re searching for something more, like he’s trying to pluck words from the air. Finally, he says, “I’m taking you home.” _

_ Shiro’s not sure what to to say to that. Do the Galra know about Earth? Did they know about the whole planet full of his friends and family and fellow humans when they sabotaged the Kerberos mission? _

_ He stares out at the stars as they race past, hungrily taking in the sights of constellations he’s never seen before. They’re beautiful. Beyond beautiful, really. He hasn’t seen the stars in what feels like decades. _

_ And one thought pierces through the haze of  _ **_safe now safe now get far away-_ **

_ Yurak sounded young. _

“Why did you get me?” Shiro asks. “Why did you stay?”

Keith pulls away gently. “There’s something on Earth that needs protecting. A weapon. The Galra can’t get to it. But they’re relentless. They’ll find Earth and the weapon eventually. Maybe not in my lifetime, but eventually.” Keith sits down heavily on the floor, scratching at the hardwood floor with his fingernails. A couple of the passes leave whitish grooves through the finish on the boards, scoring the wood with Keith’s distress. “So I do what I can.”

“So you’re just staying on Earth forever, protecting the secret about everything else in the universe?” Shiro gestures up at the night sky neither of them can see. “Don’t you think we have a right to know?”

Keith shakes his head; the shadows of his hair catch on the dark markings on his cheeks. “The more you’re aware of them, the more aware they’re of you. You’ll be a target as soon as you start looking beyond the Milky Way.” He blinks up at Shiro. “This is for the best.”

“Isn’t a Galra presence on Earth dangerous, though?” Shiro asks. “Even if you’re half Galra.”

“That’s true,” Keith admits. “I could have set up on any asteroid in the belt between Mars and Jupiter if I wanted to monitor Earth from afar.” He looks up, eyes wide and still half-golden. “I stayed for you, Shiro.”

_ “The ship’s damaged,” Yurak says to nobody in particular. Shiro, dazed and desperate, stares out the viewscreen, heart singing when he recognizes familiar constellations and planets. There’s the Moon, and- _

_ And Earth. _

_ He’s coming home. _

_ “It’s beautiful,” Yurak murmurs from beside him. _

_ Shiro smiles breathlessly. “First time?” he asks. He’s seen Earth from above so many times, but it’s never felt more incredible than this homecoming. _

_ “Something like that.” There’s a smile in his savior’s voice. Maybe he’s teasing? He turns back to the controls and mutters, “Landing protocols won’t initiate.” He presses a few buttons, but the control panel only screams back at him in a series of metallic whines. At least three new lights start flashing, and the screens gleam with the rapidly scrolling script of the Galra.  _

_ “Can’t you land it manually?” _

_ Yurak’s fingers extend like he’s about to reach out and shake some sense into Shiro, but he stops himself just in time. His clawed fingers curl into a loose fist instead, and he draws the hand back towards himself, resting it instead on one of the controls. “No,” he says tightly. “Fighters don’t really have much other than the automatic docking protocols.” _

_ That sort of makes sense. “Oh.” _

_ “We’re going to have to crash it.” A soft growl comes out from the mask, and Yurak slams his fist on the controls. It doesn’t seem to do much. He turns to Shiro, bathing him in the faint violet light of his mask’s eyes. Shiro stares back at him, wide-eyed and silent, and Yurak tilts his head.  _

_ “What?” Shiro manages to ask. _

_ Yurak’s silent for another moment, and Earth hurtles closer. “It’s just - it’s just that you look good in purple,” he says softly. His words almost get lost in the scream of the engine and the low electric hum of his mask, but Shiro knows he’s not dreaming. _

_ He stares back at the mask and wonders what this Galra looks like beneath it. _

_ The controls beep again, and the moment’s shattered. Yurak growls another curse and turns away. “We’re coming in hot.” _

_ They are. This is already far too quick for traditional landing protocols. There’s no way they’re going to have anything but a bumpy landing. They’ll be lucky to make it out alive. _

_ Shiro just hopes that this ship has good safety measures. _

_ If it doesn’t, then. Well. _

_ At least he’ll die where he belongs. _

_ Earth looms close - too close, growing larger at a breakneck pace - “You’ll be fine,” Yurak tells him, and he unstraps his own safety harness, “but this is gonna hurt.” _

_ “What are you doing?” Shiro asks in horror. They’re moving too quickly for this to be safe. “Yurak, you can’t-“ _

_ “I can,” Yurak interrupts, and he stalks over to Shiro, steps sure and strong even in the shuddering cockpit. Flames begin to lick at the outer edges of the viewscreen.  _

_ It’s not long until they crash. _

_ Yurak is small for a Galra, smaller than Shiro for sure, but he’s stronger than he looks. He wraps himself around Shiro carefully but surely, wrapping his arms around Shiro’s neck and tucking his head in close. It’s a familiar procedure; Shiro’s been through enough safety drills to know how to brace for a crash, but Yurak’s giving him more protection. _

_ He’s going to take the hit for Shiro. _

_ Distantly, Shiro wonders how someone decided he was worth saving. _

_ “Crash imminent. Hold on.” _

_ Shiro squeezes his eyes shut and tries not to think about terminal velocity. “This isn’t safe for you-” _

_ “Just hold on,” Yurak orders in his ear. _

_ This close, the electronic processing of his voice isn’t the only thing Shiro hears. There’s something beneath it that’s more like a real voice, and that alone is a comfort. _

_ Desperately, because he realizes he’s scared, he gasps, “Yurak, I-” _

_ Yurak says, so close and so urgent and so human, “Shiro-” _

_ And that’s when they crash. _

All he can remember after that is darkness, and pain, and the warmth of strong arms around him.

Keith.

“You saved me during the crash,” Shiro whispers. The realization dawns on him with equal amounts of admiration and concern. “Keith, that was-”

Keith stands abruptly, walking away towards the window. He frowns out at the darkened sky and distant stars. “Necessary,” he finishes. “I couldn’t let you get hurt after everything that had happened.”

“You - you must’ve been hurt.” Shiro reaches out carefully, resting his hands on Keith’s shoulders instead of everywhere else he needs to check. He knows all of the scars Keith hides beneath that uniform; he’s mapped them all with his eyes and hands and lips. If some of those old wounds were received on Shiro’s behalf, he’s not sure he can forgive himself.

“We heal fast. And besides, the mission would’ve been compromised if I’d stayed.” Keith looks back over his shoulder, lips a mere hair’s breadth from Shiro’s fingers. “It worked out. You’re safe.”

“All because of you.” Shiro imagines Keith limping through the desert, bloodied and broken, and resolves never to think about that again. It hurts too much to imagine Keith in peril. “You’re insane.”

“I’m in-”

Keith stops. He clears his throat, banishing whatever his final word was. Shiro’s left wondering what he meant. He looks back out the window, shoulder tense beneath Shiro’s fingers. But he sighs, and the stiffness disappears, and he asks, “You came alone? You didn’t tell?”

“The Garrison might be looking for me.” He grimaces. “I didn’t exactly make the best choices before I came here.”

“Then stay,” Keith says. “I can - I can sleep on the couch for now.” He ducks his head. “I can give you some space.”

“Space,” Shiro repeats, and his favorite word has never felt so hollow in his mouth. Like a defeat. A step back instead of a rocketing leap into the glorious unknown. 

But maybe for now, it’s for the best.

“Space,” Keith echoes, and he carefully shrugs out of Shiro’s grasp. “I’m gonna go. I think you need time to think. And sleep.” He makes his way out of the room, getting out of Shiro’s orbit, despite whatever gravity Shiro wishes would still hold them together.

He’s still in that uniform, though.

“Don’t sleep in that,” Shiro says. It must be uncomfortable.

Keith shrugs. “I’ll be fine.”

“It’s your house, Keith. I’m taking your bed; I’m imposing enough as it is.”

“Shiro-”

“No.” This time, he’s firm, and about this, he’s absolutely sure. He’s not going to make Keith suffer for his sake. Not anymore. He walks across the room and picks up his oversized discarded shirt that he must have left here a month ago. It’s well-worn; Keith must wear it often. “Take this, at least.”

Keith’s Galra-bright eyes soften. “Yeah,” he murmurs, and the soft rasp in his voice is one that Shiro’s been missing. “Yeah, okay.”

He takes the shirt and leaves the room, closing the door softly behind himself.

Shiro stares down at his hands, trying to make sense of the odd, fading sensation of claw tips over his skin.

He lies down in the bed - Keith’s bed,  _ their  _ bed - and stares at the ceiling.

He misses the starlight in Keith’s eyes already.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A steady upward slope.

Surprisingly, he doesn’t have any dreams.

Maybe he was tired enough that his mind didn’t have the energy to torment him. The empty darkness of a full night’s sleep brought its own unique challenges, though, and Shiro considers himself lucky that he only woke with chills. 

The bed’s emptier than it should be.

Instinctively, Shiro reaches to the side where he should find someone else. Of course, he doesn’t find anything or anyone there. But Keith should be there.

He wishes he were there, at least.

Shiro sighs.

Something smells like it’s cooking in the other room. Shiro’s stomach has a lot more willpower than he does, and it urges him to sit up and stretch. For once, he actually needs the careful routine of cracking his joints and easing the sleep from his aching muscles, and he works the previous days’ stress from his limbs slowly but surely. It’s quiet enough in the bedroom that he can hear something clattering in the kitchen. Keith must be awake.

Shiro remembers, all at once, just how much he’s missed him.

Two days without Keith - two days since he  _ remembered  _ \- and he wishes he could bring everything back to the way it was.

He can make steps to fix that. 

The first step is getting out of bed. 

Shiro stands, flexing the fingers and wrist of his metal arm to wake it up. It whirs to life, and the sound of its synthetic joints extending and flexing fills the room. Experimentally, Shiro picks up a spare piece of clothing and closes the metal fingers over it. The fabric crumples under his touch, and when Shiro lets the shirt fall to the ground, it’s got deep wrinkles pressed into it. Shiro frowns at the hand. It’s strong. It’s lethal.

In the back of his mind, something reminds him of the full capabilities of the hand, but Shiro banishes it. The daylight hours don’t seem like the right time to ignite the fuschia fire of the weapon the Galra gave him.

There’s time for that later. Shiro heads out of the bedroom as quietly as he can manage until he thinks better of it and makes sure he steps on all of the creaky floorboards he’s long since learned to avoid. Keith should hear him coming. He wanders into the kitchen, running a hand through his hair to attempt to tame it.

Keith looks up from the stove, wearing Shiro’s oversized shirt. He’s human again.

He doesn’t look like he’s slept.

There are dark circles beneath his eyes that approach the hue of his irises, violet-dark and bruise-like. The darkness only serves to highlight the lack of gold in his scleras. Shiro’s almost disappointed; he realizes he’d been looking forward to how the violet, alien version of Keith would look in the daylight.

Instead of giving a voice to all of that, he just asks, “You changed?”

Keith nods, though as he does, the light catches his eyes and turns them faintly yellow. So the transformation wasn’t complete, or maybe the sight of Shiro brings up emotions negative enough to bring out his native form. “Thought it would be easier for you to see.”

Maybe thanking him for that would be insensitive. Shiro keeps quiet instead and nods, making his way into the kitchen completely. His usual place at the counter has been cleared of any papers, and there’s a warm mug of coffee steaming away. It smells like Shiro’s favorite blend, the one that he picked up from town and brought to Keith’s house because he hates the cheap coffee that Keith usually buys. 

“I made breakfast,” Keith tells him. 

Usually Shiro’s awake first. Usually he’s the one to make breakfast and wake Keith up. Usually they’re both smiling.

There are a lot of things different about today, and all of the things that are still the same just make it harder.

Shiro slides gratefully into the seat and tries to make himself as small as possible. It’s hard to do; he’s big and they both know it. Maybe he succeeds.

Normally, this would be the time when Keith would drape himself across Shiro’s back, bemoaning the early hour as he sets Shiro’s coffee down in front of him. And Shiro would remind him,  _ You can go back to bed until the food’s ready, you know. _

_ But the bed’s cold without you,  _ Keith would reply, burying his nose in the nape of Shiro’s neck.  _ And you smell good in the morning. _

The memory’s strong enough that Shiro can almost close his eyes and imagine that he feels the soft brush of Keith’s lips against his skin. It’s almost perfect, and it’s nearly enough to pull him out of reality and into the warmer embrace of sweeter memories. Falling into those old habits might banish the more painful reminders of what happened far beyond their solar system.

But the frying pan clatters into the sink, and Keith swears softly in a language Shiro doesn’t understand, and the memory disappears. Shiro blinks hard and refocuses on the counter. He’s never noticed the little bit of acrylic paint that’s caked onto the surface; it’s a cheerful yellow. Curiously, Shiro picks at it. The morning sunlight glints off of his metal arm, and he clenches his fist to minimize the refraction.

Keith sets a plate of food down in front of him with more care than expected; as he does, Shiro catches a glimpse of his fingers. They’re the pale tan that he’s used to, but they still tend towards clawtips at the end instead of regular human nails.

He’s stuck thinking about that for so long that it takes him a moment to realize what’s actually on the plate. When he does, though, that sends his mind spiraling all over again. This time, the spiral is far more confusing, taking him through a train of thought that ends in  _ Oh- _

_ Keith. _

It’s such a simple thing in the grand scheme of things, but right now all Shiro can focus on is the fact that Keith has just served him bacon and eggs arranged like a smiling face.

Shiro stares.

_ He remembered. _

On the other side of the counter, Keith remains silent and picks up his coffee mug. In the silence, his nails clink against the ceramic with a sound that’s just too loud to be made by anything other than claws.

Shiro bites his lip to quell whatever emotion is swelling in his chest. It’s almost too much for him to hold.

Keith’s examining his coffee mug with remarkable focus, resolutely avoiding eye contact. 

The food really does smell delicious.

“I almost don’t want to touch them,” Shiro says, because if he addresses this directly he’s not sure how he’s going to avoid crying. 

“You need to eat.” Another step in the dance. “Keep your energy up.”

Shiro picks up his fork and pokes at one of the yolks, and he immediately regrets the way it starts running. Now it’s ruined. “But they’re so happy,” he murmurs. Or they were. He wishes they could still be.

“What’s the saying?” Keith asks, holding on tightly to his coffee mug. He stares down at the liquid inside. “You are what you eat?”

“Yeah, I hope,” Shiro replies, and he carefully cuts a corner of the egg white off with his fork, stabs it, and swirls it in the running yellow yolk. Keith’s eyes follow the movement closely, all the way up until Shiro raises his fork to his mouth to take a bite. It seems that Keith’s picked up some more skills at cooking since they’ve met; the eggs are cooked just the way Shiro likes them.

He knows Keith well enough to read the anxious anticipation written in the way he holds his shoulders. He’s not meeting Shiro’s eyes, but it’s hard not to notice the way his eyes keep flicking up to gauge Shiro’s reaction to the food. 

Shiro doesn’t even have to put on a front: the food’s good, plain and simple. After the day he’s had - did he eat anything yesterday? - it’s easy to wolf this meal down. It settles warmly in his stomach, soothing some of his rattling nerves and what feels like swarms of something anxious in his stomach. Besides, it’s easy to focus just on eating, because there’s no need for excuses for why he’s not talking to Keith.

And maybe he does feel a little better, even long after the smiling face on his plate is gone. 

Eventually, Keith stops hiding from behind his coffee cup and retrieves some nearly-burnt toast as well, sliding it onto Shiro’s plate so he can soak up the last traces of egg yolk. Shiro thanks him quietly and devours that as well. The toast’s not stellar, but it’s exquisite next to the alternative, or to Shiro’s resurfacing memories of prison food.

He tastes iron in his mouth and drowns the memory in a gulp of hot coffee.

“Thank you for this, by the way.”

Keith nods. “Least I can do.”

“Aren’t you going to eat?” Shiro asks. The shadows under Keith’s eyes aren’t going to just go away, after all. He needs his energy. 

“Had some cereal.”

Shiro knows for a fact that they don’t have cereal here. He looks up from his plate and looks Keith in the eye. “Keith.”

Keith bites his lip. The  _ tickticktick  _ of his sharp nails on his coffee cup echoes into their silence. It’s got a familiar rhythm; didn’t Shiro used to keep time like that?

The guards. Their movements-

Wait.

Back in the moment.

“Keith,” he says again, because the sound of Keith’s name is a welcome anchor to Earth. “You need to eat.” He looks down at his plate, picks up the last piece of toast, and holds it out across the kitchen counter. “This. At least this.”

For a moment, Keith hesitates, still holding onto his mug like a lifeline. But the  _ tickticktick  _ ceases, and he reaches out, plucking the charred bread from between Shiro’s fingers. He chews it slowly, avoiding eye contact, but Shiro refuses to look away until he’s sure that Keith’s eaten it all.

If Keith’s going to be taking care of Shiro, then he’s going to return the favor, regardless of this...whatever it is between them.

“Thank you,” he says when Keith’s done, and Keith nods.

And that’s enough. It’s a start.

Shiro pushes the crumbs from his toast around on his plate, trying to figure out where they go next. He says, “Look, Keith,” at the same time Keith says, “Shiro-”

They stop.

Keith bites his lip; is Shiro imagining the sharpness of his teeth? “You go first.”

“I - I wanted to thank you again.”

“For what?”

It’s a little hard to explain. Shiro twirls his fork between his fingers. “For taking me in,” he settles on saying for now. The other parts are more difficult to express in words alone. “For letting me stay here.”

“Oh.” Keith blinks. “I mean. Yeah. Of course.”

How does he manage to look so confused that Shiro’s thanking him? 

“I was gonna say that I had figured-” Keith swipes up Shiro’s discarded knife and makes a half-aborted drawing motion in midair. He must be trying to pick his words out again. Shiro waits, watching instead the steady movement of Keith’s fingers over the knife. Keith’s brow furrows and he ducks his head, frowning down at the countertop; his dark hair falls into his face. He mumbles, “Figured, in the interest of, uh. Transparency. You could ask me questions.”

“About-”

“Anything.”

Claw tips rap out a fast  _ tickticktick  _ on the countertop.

“You know.” Keith meets his eyes through the dark shadow fall of his hair. “From before.”

Shiro frowns. “Do you have time?”

“Canceled my appointments for the day.” Keith scratches at his cheek. “The whole week, actually.”

“Keith, you can’t just do that.” He knows that Keith needs that money. There aren’t any new portaits that he’s working on for the Garrison at the moment, so the freelance commissions make up all of his income. Keith’s been saving up for new parts for his hoverbike, and for a fresh set of brushes, and for some new shingles for the roof, and-

Keith says, “You think too loudly.”

“That bad, huh?”

There’s a faint air of amusement in Keith’s voice when he replies, “You’re not known for your subtlety.”

Shiro’s smiling before he realizes what he’s doing; he can feel the easy liquid growth of the grin across his lips. In this house, it’s second nature, and how can he expect to see Keith and not

Maybe it’s contagious: Keith catches his own lip between his teeth in an answering grin. 

And it’s nice.

They can work past this. They can come back from this.

Maybe they should start with an easy one. Or he hopes it’s easy. He picks up his empty coffee mug, carefully turning it in his hands. Now that he knows the strength and capabilities of the Galra one, he can’t stop thinking about how easy it would be to shatter the carefully painted ceramic. But Keith painted this, and he doesn’t want to ruin anything that Keith has touched, so instead he traces the odd symbol on it with a silver finger and asks, “This means something, doesn’t it? You said you painted it yourself.”

“It’s my organization,” Keith explains, lifting up his own mug. “The Blade of Marmora. It’s a cell of Galra resistance. My blade, if you look at it, has the same symbol.”

“Right.” Shiro stops; he frowns. “Wait. Where is that?”

“The bedroom floor.”

Keith says it so matter of factly that Shiro takes a moment to process it. When he does, though, he asks, “Why didn’t you pick it back up after last night?”

“I knew I wouldn’t need it.” Keith stares steadily at him from across the counter. “You wouldn’t hurt me.”

Shiro’s cheeks burn. He ducks his head to try to hide it, but he’s pretty sure he’s flushing all over. “Keith.”

“It’s the truth.”

“Maybe.” He doesn’t want to hurt Keith, after all.

“It’s the truth,” Keith repeats, firmer this time.

Shiro shrugs. To get away from that, he says, “Hey. Can I borrow some paper?”

Keith raises an eyebrow. “Paper?”

“If you have any to spare, I mean.” He shouldn’t be imposing. Keith doesn’t owe him anything.

“No, I mean, of course I have paper. You can take all of it if you want.” Keith springs towards the living room. Shiro looks over his shoulder to watch as he heads to a box of supplies, rifling through them and taking out a fistful of pencils and a whole pile of off-white paper. “This is just some of my sketching stuff,” he calls to Shiro. “Is that fine?”

“It’s perfect.” He knows what he needs.

“I can leave it on your chair if you want?”

_ His chair. _ He knows that Keith means the armchair in the corner of the living room. That’s where this all started, after all. Shiro turns back to the counter and smiles, thankful that he’s not facing Keith right now, and says, “That’s perfect, Keith. Thanks.”

Keith comes back around the counter after a moment and some more clattering of supplies, radiating curiosity, but it’s clear he’s not going to ask what Shiro needs the paper for. He sips at his coffee and waits quietly, staring off at a point beyond Shiro’s shoulder.

He thinks of the next question in a flash. It’s not about what’s hiding out there; instead, it’s about something far closer to home. He raises his head and asks, “What’s in the garage?” He still hasn’t forgotten their first meeting, and the glimpse of something foreign there, and how Keith forbids him from entering. 

“When my mom and dad fought off the Galra, they crashed some of the scouts’ ships. I salvaged what I could.” Keith frowns in the direction of the garage. “Maybe one day, I’ll need it to get out of this place.”

“And then...what? Where will you go?”

Keith shrugs. “Back home. To the Blades. To my mom. Back to the war. It’s been weird to be so far from the fighting.”

“You miss it.”

“Maybe. It’s all I’ve known, really. I don’t remember Earth. Just traveling with my mom and the Blades.”

“So you grew up fighting your mother’s war?”

“It’s everyone’s war, Shiro. Or it will be.” Keith frowns out the window at the distant horizon. “Eventually.”

“I still think the Garrison should know.” If the Galra are coming, then they’re all doomed.

Keith looks back at him. “How can you be sure they’ll do the right thing?” he asks softly. “How can you be sure they won’t bury the truth?”

Would they hide it? Would high command and his colleagues listen? Would they trust his word and begin preparations for a war that may come sooner than they expect? Or-

Or-

Would they lock Shiro up?

There’s something about the way Keith speaks that suggests he’s learned more than his fair share of things out there in the stars. He’s been fighting a war since his childhood; how could he not have seen the consequences of leaders learning the hard truths of the battles waged beyond their atmospheres? There must have been 

And Shiro looks into Keith’s eyes, finding the muted grief there, and he believes him.

“I’m not sure,” he admits at last. “I don’t know what to do.”

“You don’t have to know. There’s a lot of things going on for you. A lot that’s probably going to confuse you. About the Galra, and the war, and-”

“Wait. There’s something here.” Shiro closes his eyes and rubs at the side of his temples, trying to conjure up the answers he’s looking for. Everything about Kerberos is still far too murky for him to recognize. “The Galra - they’re looking for something. A weapon, you said.”

“A weapon, yeah. Or,” and Keith shrugs, “part of one. Kind of both.”

“Hm. Okay.” Shiro frowns. Something about it - he’s missing something. “I think I’ve asked enough for now.”

“If you’re sure.” Keith grabs Shiro’s empty plate and brings it to the sink, starting to vigorously scrub the leftover scraps off of it. “You’ll let me know if you have any other questions, right?”

“Yeah.” Shiro stands and looks down at himself. “I’m gonna get changed.”

Keith looks over his shoulder, studying Shiro carefully. “You know where I keep your spares,” he reminds him.

Shiro’s heart swells a little. Yeah, he’d almost forgotten that Keith’s set aside one of the drawers in the bedroom for him. “Thanks, Keith.”

 

* * *

 

He’s out underneath the sweltering desert sun with Keith late in the afternoon, working the tension out of his muscles through the calming rhythm of exercise, when the thought hits him.

The word percolates somewhere between one set of pushups and another, worming its way past the easy blankness of exertion. It messes up his count of reps, and Shiro almost banishes the thought out of irritation, but something about it bothers him. He stands, picking sand out of the palm of his hand, and asks, “Hey, Keith?”

Keith, who’d been doing a set of practiced attacks on one of the beat-up old dummies out back with him, pushes his hair out of his face and pauses his work. “Yeah?”

Shiro’s briefly entranced by the way the sunlight catches the sheen of Keith’s sun-warmed collarbone. Keith’s always looked good in the sun.

“Shiro.”

_ Fuck.  _ “Uh.” He frowns, trying to call up the word that had just been so clear to him. And it won’t obey him, slipping back out of reach into the darkness of his time with the Galra. “Never mind.” He turns away. “It was on the tip of my tongue.”

“If you’re sure,” Keith says dubiously, and he resumes his attacks in earnest.

Disappointed, Shiro picks up a few rocks and sets about testing how hard he has to clench the mechanical fingers of his Galra hand to crush them into dust. It doesn’t take much, as it turns out.

“Wait!”

Keith pauses and pulls his dagger out of the dummy, twirling it between his fingers. “What?”

“Voltron,” Shiro says, and the word comes out hushed and breathless, like the word itself knows that it’s a secret. “They want Voltron.”

Keith’s eyes gleam gold, and he flips his knife into the air. The wicked spiral of its ascent catches the sunlight, and it seems to hover in the air along with the truth, defying gravity for long heartbeats before it tumbles once more. Effortlessly, Keith catches it, but he studies it for a moment. His thumb traces the symbol of the Blade of Marmora on the hilt. Even in the sunlight, the mark glows past the edges of his finger. “That’s right,” he says at last, and though there’s tension stretching his words tight, there’s a warmth in there that feels like pride. “You just remembered?”

“Y-yeah.” Shiro leans against the wall of the house, suddenly lightheaded. “It’s a lot, Keith.”

“Hey. Shiro. Take your time; don’t strain yourself trying to chase the memories.” Keith comes over and leans against the wall next to Shiro, pressing his back to it and staring out at the desert. 

It’s helpful, actually. It’s easier to talk to Keith when he doesn’t feel the pressure of someone seeing him; seeing through him; seeing what he’s done. He tries, “Voltron?”

“It’s the weapon you mentioned. Or the sum of a few weapons.” Keith pushes off from the wall and holds up a finger. “Wait here.” He dashes into the house without another word, and there’s a muffled curse and the sound of something rattling from within. Shiro’s curious, but the turns his face towards the sun, closing his eyes to soak up its warmth. It’s nice; the Galra ship was always cold.

“Check this out.”

Keith’s before him again; he has a talent for sneaking up on Shiro. Shiro’s proud that he doesn’t jump in surprise this time; instead, he turns from the sun and opens his eyes to see Keith holding a small metal disc in his hand. From the disc, a light emerges, visible even in the bright sunlight, hovering in the air just above it. It takes the violet shape of a now-familiar symbol, the same one that Keith keeps painting on his mugs.

A hologram.

Shiro reaches out and pokes at the hologram, watching his finger pass through the image like smoke. “Amazing.”

“That’s not the point,” Keith chides quietly, thought the smile in his voice is warm. He carefully takes Shiro’s hand, holding him by his fingers instead of his wrists in only the barest echo of restraints. Shiro lets himself be moved, and Keith repositions his metal hand palm-up. “You hold it.” He places the little disc of chrome-like metal in Shiro’s hand. It slips around a bit when he doesn’t automatically “It won’t break,” Keith tells him.

But it’s so small. “Are you sure?”

Firmly, Keith nods. “I know it won’t because I know you don’t want to break it.” With one hand cradling Shiro’s, he places his other hand around his fingers and curls them into place around the hologram disc. Even though the metal fingers don’t sense touch the way human ones do, it’s not hard to feel the feather-light tenderness and warmth of Keith’s touch. It’s halfway to a caress.

Driven by instinct, Shiro lifts his human hand and places it over Keith’s. It completes their set of layers, one hand over the other over the other. He bites his lip. “Voltron,” he says to break the spell.

Keith clears his throat. “Voltron,” he agrees, and he presses a button on the disc. Five shapes flicker into life in the holographic field, familiar and alien all at once. Lions. “These are the lions of Voltron. Black, red, green, yellow, blue. They come together to form the greatest warrior the universe has ever seen.”

“Come together?” They’re robotic lions. What kind of arrangement could they possibly form?

“Yeah.” Keith stares wistfully at the hologram. “Or they used to. Voltron’s been gone for ten thousand years. Scattered, they say, by their creator.”

“Just one creator?”

“King Alfor of Altea. Greatest creator there ever was.” He frowns. “And he was killed, along with his whole planet.”

Something shifts and aches in Shiro’s chest: a grief, maybe, for a planet he’s never known. “By the Galra.”

“By the Galra.”

Maybe that’s why he feels that pain. He knows what it’s like to lose something to the Galra.

“The Galra have the Red Lion. Somehow, the Blue Lion ended up here. There are three others that are still missing, and if the Galra end up with all of them, then…”

“Then they win?” Shiro asks.

Keith nods, defeated. “Maybe we could hold them off for a while. But the lions of Voltron are invincible, as far as we know. There’s a reason they were scattered across the universe.”

“Wait, but why can’t you just take this lion and bring it where it’s safe? With your mom and your group - the Blades?”

“That’s the thing: the lions are picky. They choose their pilots.” Keith frowns out at the desert. “The Blue Lion doesn’t want me. I can’t pilot it, so I just protect it.”

Shiro nods. It’s hard to fathom, though, that a ship could have the free will to choose its pilot. A ship’s a ship, just as a weapon is a weapon, and a killer is a killer. Those are the simple truths Shiro’s learning to accept. “But what if the Garrison finds it?”

“They won’t.”

“Keith, I don’t know what the Garrison’s going to do if they come looking for me.” He pushes the disc back into Keith’s hands and puts his head in his own. “They must know that something’s wrong.”

“Something  _ is  _ wrong.”

“What?”

“You’re hurting.” Keith switches off the disc and puts it in his pocket. “You needed your space, so you left.”

“They’re gonna try to figure out the truth if I give them any hints. And I think I have.”

“Technically, it’s my mission to stop that from happening.”

Shiro draws back. His metal fingers twitch at his side. “Will you?”

Keith shakes his head. “I can’t stop you from doing anything, Shiro.”

“And if I tell them?”

“Then I deal with the consequences.” Keith looks away, staring down at his gloved, clawed hands. “Shiro, look: I know this could be a life mission, for however long it is that I live. I’m in this for the long haul. I don’t regret anything about this, least of all you.”

“You don’t-” He stops.

“Don’t what?” Keith’s gaze meets his once more. He raises his chin in a challenge, and there’s the Keith that Shiro knows, imposing and dangerous and beautiful in a deadly way. “Don’t mean that?”

He can’t possibly. Shiro shakes his head.

Softly, firmly, Keith tells him, “I don’t regret you, Shiro.” He takes Shiro’s hand - the Galra one, the killer - and holds it as if it’s something precious. 

Shiro tries to pull away. “Keith.”

Keith holds on. He’s stubborn as always, and now he unabashedly uses the Galra strength he’d only shown traces of before, resisting Shiro’s attempts to recoil from forgiveness. “I don’t regret you,” he repeats.

“How many times are you gonna tell me that?” Shiro asks.

Keith’s eyes are violet-dark and full of stars. He tells Shiro, “As many times as it takes.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

That night, Shiro stares at the bed and sighs.

What he knows is that he can’t sleep alone tonight.

He wanders to the living room, where Keith’s curled up on the couch, scrolling through something on a data pad. He looks up when he hears Shiro enter. The expression on his face shifts to one of muted concern. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah, things are good. They’re good.” He fidgets. “How are you?”

There it is again: a little smile. He’s amusing Keith. “I’m good, Shiro. You good?”

“Hey. You can say no if you want, but I was wondering if I could ask - could ask.” His words stumble to a stop. “Uh.”

The steady weight of Keith’s gaze doesn’t leave him. Shiro stares back, and he isn’t afraid. Not of Keith. Keith says, “Anything. Just tell me.”

_ Anything,  _ as if Shiro would ask anything more of him. Keith’s already given Shiro his life back, and he’s given his own safety for Shiro’s sake as well. Now his request feels insignificant, but then again Shiro wouldn’t dare ask for anything as precious as Keith’s life. “I just - I just wanted to know if you...wanted to sleep in your bed tonight.”

Keith shakes his head, and Shiro’s heart sinks. “Shiro, you need your rest, and I won’t put you on the couch-”

“Oh!” Shiro blurts, and Keith’s eyebrows shoot up. Shiro backpedals. “I mean, Keith, it’s your - it’s your bed, yeah? So I thought that maybe you could sleep in it tonight. With. Uh. With me.” He closes his mouth with a snap and inwardly groans. 

Keith stares.

Shiro swallows. “I’ll go.”

“No, wait.” Keith stands, all fluid grace, and walks up to Shiro. He stares up at him.

Shiro stares back.

He places a hand tentatively on Keith’s shoulder.

Keith immediately melts into the touch, not flinching away like Shiro half expected him to. He lets the metal hand tug him a bit closer, and then a bit more, and then he’s letting Shiro pull him close against his chest. Keith leans against him like he always has, tucking his head in against the bulk of Shiro’s chest.

Shiro squeezes his eyes shut. This is what he needs.

“I miss you,” he whispers into Keith’s hair. “I hate treating you like a stranger.” He clenches his fists and forces them open again. “Because I know you’re not. You’re the same as you’ve always been, and I-”

_ I- _

He’d been so ready to say it two days ago. He still wants to. His feelings haven’t changed.

But this doesn’t feel like the time.

Keith, into the gaping silence Shiro has left in the wake of his cut-off confession, murmurs, “I miss you too.”

That alone soothes some of the churning tension in his chest. Shiro melts into the words, tightening his hold around Keith. Keith presses back against him. It’s easy now to recognize the feeling of corded muscles stretched over the boniness of his frame, and Shiro takes solace in the knowledge that he’s holding his protector as close as he can manage. Keith hasn’t left him behind yet.

Shiro’s coming to the realization that he might not leave him behind at all.

And he thinks he loves Keith for that.

He squeezes his eyes shut against the threat of tears and inhales the warm scent of Keith. “Keith,” he murmurs, because that’s easy.

Keith tilts his head up and leaves a kiss on Shiro’s collarbone. His lips are warm and soft. Shiro shivers. He pulls away a little, and Keith’s brows furrow in a silent question, but Shiro soothes him with a kiss on the forehead. He just wants to see Keith’s face.

“Do you know who did this to me?” he asks softly. “Who took my arm?”

Before him, Keith tenses. He bares sharp teeth; they gleam in the moonlight that streams in through the threadbare curtains. “The witch,” he snarls. “Haggar.”

The name’s familiar, and he hates it.

He doesn’t even want to roll the name around between his teeth; doesn’t want to try it out in his own voice. The sound of it in Keith’s voice is dripping with enough hatred that he never wants to hear it again. 

But then again, the rough poison of Keith’s anger warms a part of him he’d thought could only be reached by tenderness. The low timbre of it vibrates through Shiro’s bones, finding a home in the muscle memory of how he’d felt when Keith had watched him from his easel across the room. Intent. Focused on Shiro. Watching his anger as an outsider, witnessing the force of his wrath on Shiro’s behalf, Shiro can’t help but think he’s beautiful.

Still, to fill the silence with something other than hate, he murmurs, “I recognize that name. She was magic.” Magic in the way that alien technology, however unfamiliar, could never be. Shiro had seen her and been terrified.

“I’ll kill her.”

Shiro blinks, appalled. “Keith,” he tries, though the other part of him is pleased.

“What? You don’t want her dead?” Keith scowls up at him, eyes glowing furious gold. “Shiro, I saw what she did to you. To the universe. She deserves something worse than death.”

Carefully, Shiro puts a hand on Keith’s cheek. Keith closes his eyes immediately, pushing his head into the touch. 

“Keith,” Shiro repeats. “I can’t ask you to do that. I can’t put that on you.” He can’t force more death into the world than what he’s already caused.

Slowly, Keith opens his eyes once more, and though his eyes are yellow, the violet in their irises is deeper than the nebulas Shiro has seen in distant starfields. “For you, I’d do it.”

“I know you would.”

That’s what scares him.

“Let’s go to bed,” Keith suggests after a time. The intensity has drained from his voice, leaving only the soft rasp that is undeniably  _ Keith. _ “You need sleep.”

“Sleep,” Shiro repeats. “Yeah.”

And he lets Keith walk them to the bedroom.

He seeks Keith’s warmth without realizing it, tugging him down to rest in their favorite spots on the bed.

It’s just natural to wrap himself around Keith, to seek comfort in his closeness. Keith doesn’t leave him in the night. The warmth of him is solid and real. He adjusts to Shiro’s fitful stirring, occasionally cracking open a sleep-hazy eye to watch him in the dark. Shiro doesn’t run away this time, and neither does Keith.

And in the middle of the night, when Shiro wakes up in a cold sweat and runs to the bathroom to retch up the memory of blood into the toilet, Keith’s there too. 

Shiro lets Keith run his fingers through his hair, comforting and practical, holding it back and grounding him with the barest hint of claw tips across his skin. His cheeks burn with shame and he’s pretty sure he’s started crying too, because tonight his mind has decided to remind him of the deaths, and the blood, and-

“Shiro,” Keith soothes softly, and Shiro sobs a bit.

It hurts. It  _ hurts,  _ but Keith’s here.

“Thank you,” he whispers when he’s done, swallowing uncomfortably around the rawness of his throat.

Keith, still behind him, just rubs at his shoulders, easing away some of the aching tension there. “I’ve got you.” He helps Shiro stand, passes him his toothbrush, and murmurs that he’ll be back in bed whenever Shiro’s ready to sleep again.

When he finally manages to catch his breath, splash some water on his face, and brush the taste of fear out of his mouth, he wanders back through the darkened house to the bedroom. Keith’s there, eyes half-open, gleaming violet with a starlight all their own. He wordlessly lifts the sheets for Shiro, letting him slide back into place on his side of the bed. Shiro squeezes his hand, and the corner of Keith’s mouth tips up into a smile. 

It’s hard to look at the worried lines on Keith’s face and know that he’s the cause of them.

Shiro offers him a little smile and settles in; this time, he sticks to his side of the bed.

And Keith gives him his space. He doesn’t try to push himself any closer to Shiro.

Shiro hugs one of the pillows to his chest anyway. Even if he can’t bear too much touch right now, rubbed raw by the memory of violence, he can still wrap himself in the scent of home. 

So he does, and his nightmares don’t wake him for the rest of the night.

In the morning, he wakes up first, picks up the pens and paper Keith left for him, and starts walking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry that it's been a while! College is hard, guys.

**Author's Note:**

> find me on tumblr at [earthspaladins!](http://www.earthspaladins.tumblr.com)


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